#he also did a bunch of studio recordings

[wintersera]

"so are you ovulating?" || ningning x succubus!reader

notes: i actually wrote this fairly quick, but finding the right pics for the moodbaoard actually pissed me off erm.. but first of all FIRST NINGNING FIC WE CHEERED (a/n i forgot to say this was a part two of the succubus!reader thing soooo here’s the link!)

cw: tail sex (kinda), succubus!reader, top!ning, bottom!reader, mentions of a singular man

wc: 4k

after the ‘feeding on your unnie’ incident that had happened a few months ago, your performance was phenomenal. with all that energy you gained from that one night, plus some extra other nights following from then with jimin unnie, it was as if your every move, every note and every emotion was amplified by tenfold. you were on fire and the audience could feel your passion for performance burning brightly with every stage you did.

your mentors and managers commented on how energetic you had been for the past couple of months, how your performances were absolutely phenomenal, the knetz weren’t on your ass - which was surprising since almost half of them were all the time. the western fans said that you were, quote on quote,“serving cunt” in the recent solo weverse live you did… whatever that meant. even your own members were surprised at how active you were throughought day and night. 

but like everything in life, things weren’t bound to stay all too well.

a few days ago you tripped on stage, and to make matters worse, it was in front of your fans. the audience heard a small little thud and spotted you on the ground looking at the ceiling for a few seconds before you stood up embarrassingly. luckily this was the first take, you had other opportunities to do your very best with the smidge of energy you had left. 

knowing your fans, particularly your stans - either they’d make a meme out of you spacing out on the floor, or, they’d spam hashtags all over twitter saying “SM PROTECT YOUR ARTIST” or something around those lines.

not only did that happen, but whilst you were preparing to record your lines in the studio, that familiar pain you would get whenever you were starved from energy came back ten times worse; it felt like you were being pierced in the stomach.

jimin noticed your pained expression and squeezed your shoulder in reassurance as she entered the recording room, but it kind of translated wrong in your head, causing you to moan out loud into the mic in front of your directors - not to mention you could hear yourself through the headphones echo. jimin chuckled lightly “what’s up with you?” then left the room a moment afterwords.

fast forward to the present day. a mundane and repetitive one. you had a photoshoot early in morning and a small meeting sometime in the afternoon and then you were free to do whatever you wanted afterwards. you thought that maybe some vocal lessons later in the evening would distract you, but you were pretty sure your vocal teacher was out with his husband drinking today. good on him, it buys you more alone time, and alone time makes you think about what to do about your situation. 

on to more pressing matters, aka your raging desire for sex. 

it randomly hit you hard while walking back from the company to your local seven eleven. you thought to distract yourself with buying a sweet treat for everyone, but instead you began to feel dizzy “ouh.. this isn’t good” there wasn’t a bunch of groupies following you around the block to your own misfortune, and it was still bright outside.so what was there to do about that urge?

it’s not like you could message jimin unnie out of the blue and ask to fuck. where was the decorum? plus you’re in the middle of promotions, what if you drain too much energy that she’s unable to perform the next day.

and it also didn’t help that your internal monologue was fucking you up.

“shit, do i just ask the manager to… NO- ew what the hell am i thinking? he’s way older than me. nevermind. why did i think about that jesus christ.” 

your options were slim. it was either wait for night, go to the practice rooms and prey on a cute trainee, with consent of course - or go ask jimin unnie again and risk exhausting her even though you just started promotions… 

you wondered who was at home right now.

you recalled ning going straight back home as soon as the meeting had finished. you could always ask? i mean she is your unnie after all, it wouldn’t hurt to ask to her. 

ah, but it would be awkward though. it’s not like when jimin unnie walked in on you tweaking out and then you had to shamefully ask her to “help you out”. either way you had to go home and do something about it. being out in the open wouldn’t be good for you anyway. anymore stress and you could lose your mind, probably going out of your way to do something that would be highly illegal, and you wouldn’t wish that on anyone.

–

on the way home you couldn’t suppress your excitement. you had already made up your mind to ask ning if you could, you know, do something nasty. multiple scenes were made up in your head. she could bend you over the table, press you against the wall and limit your restrictions with her pretty hands, or maybe she could shove your head into the pillow and pound into your desperate pussy.

as opposed to jimin, you never caught ning wound up in her own thoughts, nor staring at you in a sexual manner. whether it was pracitce, a stage, any event with the members, or an upcoming show, you had never caught her once. maybe she did look at you while you were dancing promiscuously as a joke. even so, her expressions were so nonchalant that even if she was, you would never be able to tell… though that thought alone excited you even more. who knows what her pretty little head was thinking about.

although jimin said to tell the other members about who you actually were to prevent you from being too awkward to ask your members for help, you refrained from doing so because well… you’re just like that, what else. how were you gonna do it anyway- hold a meeting in your apartment around the dining table and say that you need sex to stay active and alive? then what, they’ll eagerly accept the fact that you literally need to be inside of them, or vice versa, so you can get up on stage and preform as if it was a regular ass day.

those five minutes you spent daydreaming and thinking about telling your members were stopped abruptly by the door in front of you. when did the walk home become so quick.

then you started to think once again. 

would ning be the type of person to go out of their way to help you? yes she’s that type of person, however, does that mean she would willingly want to have sex with you… god, you don’t know her ‘that’ well. you’re close, close as how close a lifetime friend could ever be, but still, things would be weird if she ultimately says no to your request.

“you’ve been staring at the door for an awfully long time y/n. are you coming inside or do you want to stare at the door a little longer?”

fresh out of the shower, yizhuo greets you with a friendly smile followed by a giggle. her towel sticking against her body showing off the curves of her hips. 

oh fuck, why does she have to be wearing that now. 

“did you just finish showering? also, girl… get back inside. what if someone sees you with just a towel on” the aroma of your shampoo wafted through the air “you smell good…” you all were tight on money this month, so you all shared things like perfumes, shampoos, pretty much all products you and the other members owned. each time either one of your members had applied your shampoo, god, you had such perverse thought about them, wanting to ravage them until they couldn’t walk or even stand

“yeah i ran out of mine- and yours was newly opened so you know” she had been looking way too good recently, not saying that she never did look good, but there was something about her that made you feel extra desperate and needy. the wetness between your thighs spoke for themselves

“let’s go in. i need to talk to you quickly before my brain explodes” yizhuo cocked her head in confusion, reluctantly following your lead, closing the door behind her as you walked into your guys’ apartment. 

you followed behind her as she led you to your shared bedroom, looking up because you didn’t want to turn yourself on even more by staring at her ass “wow, the ceiling looked nice. a pretty beige colour… what the hell am i doing” you thought to yourself with a heavy sigh, looking back down and regretting it immediately. you noticed that yizhuo turned around as you locked eyes with the front of her cream coloured bath towel.

as perceptive as yizhuo was, she noticed a little black swish behind your back. she just played it off, too tired from all the practice, so she thought she was hallucinating a tail or something of the sorts.

now, being both the youngest and the least serious members of the group, you rarely ever had a heart to heart. to talk one to one with each other with the tone you had used, yizhuo must’ve thought that there was some topic you couldn’t bring up with the eldest “hey what’s up? it’s been a while since we last talked seriously” her damp hair against her soft looking skin, the fresh scent of soap and the way she looked at you with worry in her eyes. it almost drove you off the edge. she was so tantalising that you almost missed your cue to speak.

“uh- um, you know how we’ve been besties since i came to korea right?”

“yes”

“and you know we said that we’d always tell each other anything right?” you glanced around the room, avoiding her gaze while your fingers unconsciously played with the fabric of her bedsheets.

“yes…?” ning pondered for a while “…are you going to confess your undying love for me, is that what this is?” she cackled.

“WHAT? no, no- i think that might be less shocking than what i’m about to say” you take a deep breath in hopes to stifle the sound emitting from your booming heartbeat “okay so like, hypothetically speaking, would you have sex with any of the four of us?” for a god awful few seconds you sat tensely, waiting for yizhuo to say something. 

“are you trying to redirect my attention from a more important question girl?” her eyes rested on your face, heartily laughing until she released you were being totally serious. 

scratching your arm, you let out a sigh. it would be better to ask her directly wouldn’t it “you don’t need to analyse me like that. i was just saying-”

you could charm her into agreeing, but in the long run you’d feel like a horrible person. charming a person came with moral problems, and you strictly told yourself that you would never do that to a person. ever.  

“yizhuo… can we- can you do me a favour?” your stuttering caught her attention. you simply couldn’t bring yourself to ask, it’s strange out of the blue. 

“mhm mhm, what do you need”

“you”

“me?”

“yes.” with every fibre of your being you held back a variety of different ways to scream out ‘JUST FUCK ME’ biting your lip to help fight back a blush. it’s odd to blurt out ‘im a succubus. let’s have crazy passionate intimate gay sex right here right now’ 

hold on- does she even know you’re a succubus? “listen, it’s going to sound absurd and you probably think i’m not sober, but can you hear me out” it was still weird to outwardly say that you were in fact this demon thing that sucks people dry, literally. saying it to jimin was no easy feat, but you were obviously losing your damn mind that day. and then you have the other two members too? now was not the time to think about what you’d do in the near future, you were hungry and yizhuo was right in front of you, practically naked “are you, by any chance, okay with maybe” your gaze darted around the room before you locked eyes with her “maybe having… sex? maybe?”

“ohhh, okay i see how it is. you’re ovulating” she spoke with a dead serious tone.

you were losing your mind. you couldn’t tell if she was fucking with you or not. but in all honesty, yizhuo did think you looked like you were ovulating with the way your thighs pressed together. yup, ovulating.

your heart began to race as you increasingly became desperate within seconds. you felt feverish, hot to the touch while your head throbbed. almost a whole two months without tending to your needs ended up with you succumbing to the symptoms “please yizhuo. i need you to do something, anything- i feel like i’m gonna die actually” 

“woah woaah, let’s calm down. you’re not gonna die silly. is it just-“ yizhuo paused for a while, coughed and maybe even hesitated to say the word “sex. is that all? it can’t be too bad. plus if it’s with you, i don’t mind…” yizhuo’s words were genuine. it put your mind at ease. 

“you don’t understand though. it’s like… it- i don’t know” you pout at her with the remaining energy left in your body “it’s alright- i’ll ask other people, it’ll be okay” sluggishly pushing yourself off yizhuo’s bed.

“no no, i get it. you wanna relieve stress, i get it” from what you could understand, yizhuo was trying her absolute best, trying to relate with your problem “we’ve all been there. the company doesn’t allow us to go out and meet other idols like that so it was eventually gonna happen. i mea-“

“it’s not about that, yizhuo” your eyes darken, a desperate sigh emitting from your lips “ah, whatever…” with trembling hands, you held yizhuo’s in yours, momentarily silencing her as you sit back down on top of the smooth sheets of her bed “if you’re not okay with doing ‘this’, then will a kiss be okay?” there was a hint of softness to your voice, the rest shrouded with seriousness “it won’t be enough for me, but it’ll keep me… sort of stable” you shut your eyes as you press your forehead against hers, sharing the warmth “please, that’s all i ask for” 

she whispered “a kiss? i can do that. it seems fun.”ning, inches away from kissing you, smiled sheepishly. her gaze drifted briefly towards your lips before finally shutting her eyes  “and if it’s with you i think i’ll be okay”  

you took this as your opportunity to kiss her softly on the lips. a quick peck really. a surge of energy coursed through your veins for half a second before coming to a stop.

that’s all the energy you’ll take from her, and the most you’ll take for the next couple of days “mmm… thank you yizhuo” though it was a sweet couple of seconds before it broke off, the sweetness of her lips left a longing impression on you.

yizhuo asked for “one more kiss?” growing in confidence, she leaned into another, her eyes fluttering shut as she melted into your embrace. though you were unsure, you gave into the moment, savouring her delicate lips. her fingers tentatively reached for your shirt, grabbing you and pulling you in closer. as the kiss intensified, yizhuo’s hands journeyed down your back, directly pushing down so your chests were pressed together “do whatever you want…” her breath hitched as you trailed down kisses from her jaw down to her neck, taking the time and effort to not accidentally leave a huge hickey there. you replied by pushing her back onto the bed, the loose towel that wrapped around body fell apart easily, exposing yizhuo’s pretty tits. she paid no mind, letting you do whatever you pleased. 

“god, you’re so pretty” you climbed onto the bed, straddling yizhuo’s waist as you carefully removed your t-shirt. 

she burned holes through your face, why was she staring so hard all of a sudden? “how are your eyes pink, y/n” taken aback, she sits up and examines your face. she raised her hand and waved it in front of you “is this thing real?” tilting her head in confusion. 

“it is real- mmh?” a jolt shoots right up through your spine and then down to your core out of nowhere. ning held your sleek black tail, rubbing her fingers against the weird leathery texture, caressing and prodding at your poor flimsy, slightly erect(?) tail, as you let out a soft sigh. “yizhuo…” you mewl pathetically “that- that feels weird”

“does it now?” her tongue darted out, licking the centre of your heart shaped tail with the ever so subtle tug at the corner of her lips “sensitive much” a couple more licks and kisses to your tail and you were pretty much done for. 

time to time you forget that you have some sort of libido increasing, aphrodisiac power. the kiss you two shared may have affected her. well it definitely did. the increase of confidence radiating from the older girl was way different in comparison to her usual self. cause by now you’d expect her to be a little more gentle with you.

flipping positions, yizhuo held you down with her two hands with a devilish look on her face “if it’s sex you want, then i’ll make sure to fuck you till your begging for me to stop” her hand travelled down your tail, stroking it as if she was stroking your dick. never before had someone do something like that to your tail, but my god did it feel so fucking good.

she toyed with it, prodded and poked the tip of it and sucked it with her pretty pink and plump lips. the other hand cupped your chest, fondling over your boobs to get a feel for her own satisfaction “i could get used to this…” being on top of you, she had the advantage to do whatever she desired, and also because you were too weak to move at all “what do you want y/n? want me to fuck you with my tongue or my fingers. you choose”

you chose the latter.

throwing your head back onto the fluffed up pillows, yizhuo waisted no time and went to her destination. not one, but two fingers pushed deep inside of your pussy, stretching you out so good. her lustfully hooded eyes looked down at you, absorbing in the expressions of your pleasure contorted face “how’s it feel? want me to add another for you baby?” 

unable to answer her question with words, you nod eagerly, wanting nothing but her fingers to fill you up. so she did, adding in a third finger since you asked to cutely with that nod of yours. now knuckles deep inside, that same devilish grin spread across her face. you unconsciously buck your hips up, smiling wearily at yizhuo “so.. so deep” your moans urged her to immediately start moving. she started out nice and slow, curling her fingers at different intervals to squeeze out those lovely moans of yours. every thrust, she explored your spongy walls, testing out the waters to see which place hit the best for you. then as time went by, she gradually built up her pace until she came to her desired speed.

three fingered merciselessly pounded hard into your tight cunt, your juices leaking and dripping onto yizhuo’s bedsheets, and the sounds of your wetness leaving the chinese girl in awe. noticing the way your hips began to meet with her speed, her hand that played with your tail slowly slided towards them, holding you down by the stomach “let me do all the work” driven by your moans, she leans down to press a hungry kiss on your lips, then leaving a hot trail of kisses down from your neck and onto your perky nipples.

swirling around the hardened bud on your chest, a guttural moan catches her attention “you like it when i suck on your tits, huh?” her thumb pressed against your swollen clit as she muttered those words, all the while still paying attention to your sensitive tits. she enjoyed the way you tried to wriggle your hips in attempts to move them, and how your hands clutched the sheets with pure desperation. she felt hazy, maybe a little bit tipsy somehow, but all she wanted to do was fuck you until you were screaming her name.

as her fingers continued to slide against your walls, hitting the right spots at an intense speed, you felt a knot form in your stomach. you were so desperate for relief, needing to buck your hips into her palm to get that sweet friction you felt on your clit, but she didn’t allow you to do that; her hand still resting on your stomach to stop you from squirming “yi-yizhuo~” you whined, teary eyes staring at her with a pitiful look “please yizhuo.. r-rub my clit please~”

and who was she to deny you.

though she didn’t do exactly what you wanted, she did something way more better. moving away from your nipples, she lowered herself down onto the bottom of her bed to shove her face right between your thighs. tongue darting out her mouth, she gives a few kitten licks on your clit, savouring the sweet essence of your pussy for a starter. those tiny kitten licks turned into something much more. the tip of her tongue circled against your heat, occasionally wrapping her lips around to give you a quick suck before continuing to lap your soaked folds up to your sensitive clit. 

the stimulation drove your crazy. you never knew that yizhuo was so skilled at this. still thrusting those three fingers inside of your now pulsating cunt, at the hot and wet kisses and licks she left on your clit, she knew - and you knew, that you were on the verge of toppling over the edge. but it wasn’t enough for her “is that good, hm? does my needy baby want me to fuck her harder?” yizhuo somehow had the strength to speed up, fucking your hole as she moans at how well you’re taking her. 

those words vibrated from your core and sent shivers across your spine, leaving goosebumps all over your skin - in which also made you clench around her fingers. 

fuck, it was way too damn good. you felt your legs shaking, jaw opening wide, stomach tightening and that course of hot pleasure travelling through your entire nervous system “close- close yizhuo.. don’t stop” your words came out slurred, a few unintelligible praises and swears being ripped out of the back of your throat as you felt yourself on the edge. 

with one final deep and hard thrust, your jaw slacked open as your orgasm was pulled out from your body, legs twitching and spasming as you repetitively screamed out yizhuo’s name alongside even more praises. for a minute your body fell limp against the bed, exhausted from the mind blowing orgasm yizhuo gave you, and also from the built up stress you had from promotions.

now full of the sexual energy you gained from yizhuo, you spring upwards, patting yizhuo’s head gently “t-thank you… i feel refreshed…” 

the older girl finally sat up after she cleaned you up. wiping her face and chin from the juices that dripped all the way down, she flashed you a smile “with that tail of yours, and those pink eyes, you’ve got to be a succubus… right? to answer her question, you nodded, cheeks red from her straightforwardness. 

“y-yeah. you’re right… wanna go again?”

“only if i bottom next”

[chaaistained]

what’s in my bag — kpop dr .•°

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cannot begin to describe how long this took me T^T so i hope you like it !! anyway, here is what’s in my bag in my kpop/clarity dr !!!

my bag is the adidas original pu biker bag !! i got it from an adidas campaign that clarity did. one thing to note is that i’m scripting there are two versions and ver 2 has longer straps bcs i’m more comfortable with that !!

on the front of the bag i’ve got some decor!! some small little things to personalise it hshshs :

⟢ my mum’s claw clip — she gave it to me when she came to visit, i’ve got it clipped onto one of the straps

⟢ a carabiner from sabrina carpenter — it has the engraving “You Are My Lucky Star”, i’ve attached a few charms to it :

•⟢ a lucky 7 ball — i love the number 7, i love that shade of red and the number itself reminds me of enhypen (who i’m a huge fan of!!)

•⟢ a light stick keychain — i’ve just used the enhypen light stick as an example but in actuality, it’s clarity’s light stick aka the claridome, i’m matching with my members !!

•⟢ the purple candy store series sonny angel — also matching with my members bcs this series has our designated colours !!

next up are the exterior pockets !!

in side pocket 1 i have :

⟢ my keys — obvious necessity of course, i’ve got my car keys, my house/dorm, and then some company keys : the music studio, dance studio, recording studio and my locker. attached onto the keys are two key rings :

•⟢ a little mushroom — from the day i landed in south korea after being accepted into fantagio ent. as a trainee!! i needed to get smth to commemorate it bcs i’m nothing if not sentimental

•⟢ a resin orchid flower charm with bronzite, cherry quartz and pearl beads — a gift from jungwon !! it was during a secret santa that we did with the other 04’ idols in our friend group

⟢ three lippies :

•⟢ a clarins plum lip oil , a burt’s bees coconut & pear lip balm and a burt’s bees cucumber and mint lip balm — super niche flavours of lip balm but i can’t lie, they’re my absolute favourites

⟢ a tiny perfume — jasmine and sandalwood scented ofcs

⟢ a small shell shaped jewellery box — usually i’d take off any jewellery i’m wearing when i get tired or overstimulated, it can fit quite a lot of things including earrings, necklaces, rings, bracelets (that aren’t solid like bangles), but even if i’m wearing all my jewellery, it serves the purpose of housing my guitar picks

in the front pocket i have : my snacks!!

⟢ two packs of jumpy’s — a little treat from enhypen’s jake when he ordered a bunch of aussie snacks

⟢ warheads — i love sour things so i’ve always got a pack on me

⟢ sour blueberry bubblegum — this isn’t always in my bag but if i can find this specific brand and flavour, i def have it with me (another sour one)

⟢ chai tea sachets — god forbid whatever hotel we’re staying at doesn’t have chai

⟢ mint strips bcs obvs

in side pocket 2 i have :

⟢ two sets of headphones — my beats fit pro bluetooth headphones in grey, and my apple wired headphones that i keep just in case my bluetooth’s lose charge, and to stop them from getting tangled, the wired headphones live in this little shell trinket box

⟢ a tiny vial of moon water — it’s cute, it’s spiritual, it’s shaped like a star, what more can i say?

⟢ a capo — i got it as a gift from enhypen’s jay !!

⟢ a lace draw string bag full of crystals — a citrine tumble, a tigers eye tumble, a labradorite tumble, a flower agate palm stone and a raw herkimer diamond

ok here comes the main pocket !!

⟢ yes, i’ve got two phones — a personal phone and a work phone :

•⟢ my personal phone is the iphone 11 in purple — it has a polaroid of clarity during our tour in sydney !! it was taken by our manager and i keep it in the case

•⟢ my work phone is the iphone 14 in baby blue — it has a tiny little teddy bear charm attached to it’s clear case, i got the charm from a lumino (our fandom name!!)

⟢ a portable charger bcs obvs

⟢ my current read — i always have a book on me, and i tend to read multiple books so i’ll have ebooks on both phones as well as a physical book in my bag aksjdjs, my current read is The God Of Small Things by Arundathi Roy, a gift from my dad !!

⟢ two notebooks, each for a different purpose :

•⟢ my journal — the brown leather book, embossed with prints of flowers, a few sticker stamps that i got as a gift from vicki’s stamp collection, it’s a mess of a mind dump, a complete amalgamation of thoughts, un-curated, unfiltered, and extremely authentic, the notebook itself was part of a birthday present from my members !!

•⟢ my lyric book — the little red notebook that i found at a corner store in some nook of london, i got it during our first world tour and have been using it as the place to go when i get random inspiration

⟢ a tiny teddy bear plush toy — i got it from my little brother when i visited home again after a long time

⟢ a digital camera — i got it from enhypen’s sunghoon on my twentieth birthday bcs not only was i an official adult but it was also nearing the end of our mc-ing contract

⟢ finally, i’ve got four seperate pouches inside the main pocket :

•⟢ my makeup pouch — a vivienne westwood red pouch that i bought with my own money . and then i became an ambassador like, a week later.. all i had to do was wait a week.. typical

•⟢ my hygienics pouch — got it from a lumino during a fansign !! they said it reminded them of regulus and they knew i was a huge regulus stan so they got it for me ??? i cried

•⟢ my pencil case — i’ve had it since predebut, never want to get rid of it, i actively mended it when the zipper came loose once .. it’s staying with me till the end i fear

•⟢ my wallet — idek where i got this, it just showed up one day in my closet and i just ran with it, surprisingly fits everything i need tho

in my makeup pouch i have :

⟢ a beautiful compact mirror — i got this from chris aka stray kid’s bang chan aka my big cousin!!

⟢ a lighter — found it online and immediately had to get it bcs it looks so pretty, i’m not a smoker necessarily but i just like having a lighter, i’ve got a couple friends who smoke and it comes in handy, plus i can use it for candles

⟢ some actual makeup products, shock horror :

•⟢ a kiko clear gloss — i’m partial to tinted glosses but i like having the option

•⟢ tinted burt’s bees lip balm in plum — same thing here

•⟢ a bobbi brown concealer, a rare beauty highlighter and a diamond clear mascara — i unfortunately don’t wear makeup in my cr bcs i have ridiculously sensitive skin so i have no clue abt the shades or the quality of these products T^T i just know i need to have them ahshdjsjsk

⟢ a comb — i can’t go to sleep without at least brushing the ends of my hair, i don’t know, anyway i got it from india at the local markets and it’s very pretty

⟢ hair ties bcs obvs — i would have also put scrunchies or smth but knowing me, i’d probably mooch off of aining’s scrunchies (just like in this reality >.<)

in my hygienics pouch i have :

⟢ a lot of obvs necessities — kleenex, deodorant, hand sanitiser, moisturiser, bandaids, pads

⟢ vaseline — dry skin is a bitch but i vow to conquer it

⟢ eye serum — idk what i’d do without it like do y’all understand how bright and arid those stage lights are??

⟢ sun screen — this isn’t in the obvs section bcs this is specifically australian made sunscreen, spf 50+ i even use it in this reality

⟢ meds — vitamins, anti histamines, anxiety pills

in my pencil case i have :

⟢ 0.35 black ink pens — for the life of me i could not find the brand name but i have these exact pens in every reality, i worship them, they are glorious

⟢ a silver mechanical pencil — same deal, the one in this reality i’ve had since 2019 i believe? and i couldn’t find a pic of this but i also have a small pack of lead as well

⟢ erasers — snoopy/peanuts themed bcs i adore that franchise and i unfortunately buy things just bcs they’re peanuts themed..

⟢ a small love note from jungwon !! — passed to me between the hallways of an award show, right before enha left for tour, i don’t think he knows that i’ve kept it

in my wallet i have :

⟢ my cards — yes i have a black card, yes i use it whenever i can, yes i can feel the stares every time

⟢ cash and coins — coming from a regular middle class lifestyle means i never get out of the habit of keeping physical money on me, ya know, just in case

⟢ perfume scent testers/cards — idk they’re fun to keep, gives my wallet a funky yet intoxicating scent, i keep adding new ones every time i go to the perfume section, even if i don’t buy anything

⟢ a queen of spades card from a deck with indian artwork — i got it as a gift from a lumino, and it was so thoughtful bcs the queen of spades is actually linked to clarity lore, specifically my lore in our groups concept, plus, it’s an indian queen !!!

⟢ a tiny passport photo of baby me — one of those sentimental things that my parents gave me before i left to start training, i always keep it with me as a reminder; anytime i’m mean to myself or forget to ignore the negative comments i may get, i’m actually hurting that little girl right there, she doesn’t deserve that, so i don’t deserve it

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there’s a lot i didn’t add bcs it wouldn’t realistically fit, and also i’ve got my manager to carry some stuff for us — more makeup, vlogging equipment, more toiletries, etc etc .. anyway!! this took ages so i really hope this does well 🥲🤞🏽

chaai brews; tea assortments — dr archive

2025 © chaaistained

[ms-demeanor]

There's a guy I'm ???????? vaguely friends with who is friends with Large Bastard, large bastard was a groomsman at his wedding and I was his wedding photographer and anyway this guy was the sound guy at the Roxy for the better part of a decade and used to have a fully analog recording studio set up and did full album recording until like ten years ago my bandmate recorded an ep in his studio once and tbh i always wanted him to engineer a recording for P.I.T. but anyway he was in this actually musically compelling christian hardcore band that played locally and was on warped tour one year (aww look i found an archive of an angelfire site noting shows this one girl was interested n happy almost twenty fifth anniversary to the ataris playing the glass house my buddy's band was there on the 20th)

and anyway i am relistening to their second album and you know what, it's still pretty good and also I know a lot of weird people who have done a lot of weird things.

(i know at least two people who were in touring christian hardcore bands that made music that is better than either christian music or hardcore usually are and I don't think that means anything but it's weird that it happened twice, though admittedly i found the other guy's music more interesting in his non-christian non-hardcore bands)

Anyway here are some songs from that album that are definitely from the same album but don't seem like it if you're listening in isolation.

This is a song that people are less likely to parse as a song but that I like as a song; the spine of the thing is a sped-up recording of my buddy tuning a piano, it's mixed in with a bunch of other found sounds.

I think I'm realizing that my taste is basically "acts that are abrasively loud or heavy but also clearly into jazz."

Anyway i think if I don't make music at some point soon i am going to explode.

[ecrivainalene]

Leviathan Panel at Otakon 2024

I was OVERJOYED to be at the Leviathan panel during Otakon 2024! I'll do my best to recap it below, but if you want a more coherent play by play, this Twitter user did an excellent job.

I've got a handful of photos, recap of Sharp Gender Discussion, plus misc. things I remember.

Not everyone was up for the entire time, but I snapped this photo near the end when everyone was on stage! From left to right: Waki Kiyotaka (Studio Orange), Yoshihiro Watanabe (Studio Orange), Scott Westerfeld, Christophe Ferreira (Quibic Pictures), Justin Leach (Quibic Pictures), Katrina Minett (Quibic Pictures), and Diana Garnet (ending theme vocalist).

New concept art! Looks like Dr. Barlow, Klopp, Alek, and Sharp, right before the Germans attack the Leviathan.

More under the cut!

Alternative shot of that art bc I couldn't get my lighting right:

Clanker and Darwinist technology designs. Watanave explained that Studio Orange's early days were spent doing contract work on Gundam anime, so I can't wait to see how that translates to the Clanker machines.

Some more concept art:

By the way, the entire series is being adapted at once - so we'll get the complete story at once! That in mind, the second image here makes me think of that maneuver near the beginning of Goliath to pick up the cargo.

Sharp!!! Look at them!!!

I don't have much to say about these but I'm fairly sure I hadn't seen them before. I am wondering if they downsized Alek's crew for the sake of the story, or perhaps we just haven't seem Bauer and Hoffman yet.

We got some new character art! The panel was very cryptic about who the character designer is. Apparently they're pretty well known, but they can't share it yet!

Volger I am so sorry your photo was unfocused. Forgive me.

The panel jokingly described him as "Alek's dad," which feels accurate. And maybe I misunderstood, but it sounds like he plays an even more important role in the anime than he does in the books. I've always considered Volger to be a pretty important character, so I wonder what else he'll do in this new series.

Klopp looks exactly like how I pictured him in my mind!! They said if Volger is Alek's dad, then Klopp is like his mom. Which is very fair but also made me laugh a lot.

Dr. Barlow!! She looks amazing. There was a lot of talk about the dynamic between her and Volger and how they're often playing mental chess games with each other. I'm really glad they're leaning into that dynamic.

And one more concept art:

This looks like the visit to Istanbul, which I'm desperately hoping means we'll see my favorite chaotic bisexual, Lilit.

That's all of the photos I have! They also showed us a preview of the show plus a live performance of the ending song with Diana Garnet. No video recording was allowed and I don't break rules, but believe me when I tell you it was stunning. The world feels so full of life and adventure and I can't wait to see the final show.

Tbh I was too busy holding back tears of joy but one thing I remember distinctly is there's a shot of Sharp getting ready for the day, and we see a sheet of paper with a bunch of names written and crossed out before finally (I think) "Dylan" is circled.

Which actually brings me to the Q&A part. TLDR, between the use of "Sharp" for Deryn's name, Scott referring to Sharp as "she/he/they" during the panel, and the scene I mentioned earlier, I feel really hopeful about how they're approaching Deryn's gender and identity in this adaptation.

I asked a question about this at the Q&A and voice recorded it, so I'll try to transcribe it here as best I can because the audio is not great lol. I stumbled through my question so I trimmed it down here but I'll transcribe the response as clearly as I can!

Me: I just finished re-reading [the series] for the first time since I was probably in high school, and one of the things that interests me about this adaptation is the approach to Sharp's character... I guess I'm just interested, like, was there a lot of thought put behind, or what kind of thought was put behind how to approach their character in the anime, I guess as a chance to re-approach the story however many years after it was originally written.

Scott Westerfeld: Yeah, there's a lot to that. The "girl dressing as a boy" as a trope was something completely different in 2007 when I started writing this than it is now. And so we really approached Deryn's identity as what was at stake rather than just... rather than just her being in disguise, it's about their recreating themselves and becoming a different person and transitioning and, and so... but it's always been interesting to me that the words that I wrote back in 2009, 10, 11, y'know, as an old guy who grew up in Texas in the 70s - who was David Bowie fan! - but otherwise didn't have a lot of access into issues of gender, I'm amazed at how many people have been [able to?] adopt Deryn/Dylan as one of their own. I just got an email a week ago from a trans boy whose chosen name is Dylan. So it is amazing to me how whatever imperfections or whatever problematics there are in the text, people still find their way into what they need from a character. And as a writer, I can say that I always respected that character, I always respected their choices, I always respected who they were. I never tried to stick them into a dress and have everyone go "Ooh now you're pretty 'because 'cause you're in dress!" We didn't do that, and I think that what may be important for people and I think that's why it's still what's gonna work here, but it's been fun to be able to update it and everybody on the team's been really great about understanding that.

TLDR I don't want to get anyone's hopes up too high, but I'm really appreciative of the care that's being taken with Sharp's story and identity in this adaptation. It seems like Scott and the others on the team are taking that into account, and I'm excited to see how it plays out.

Other random things I remember:

THERE WAS AN ALEK COSPLAYER. I took a photo with them but I won't post it without their consent. Just trust that they looked fantastic.

Scott said one of the first things he was told was that Alek can't actually kill Nikola Tesla because he's too well loved by people in Japan, which I think is the funniest possible reason for a change to be made in an adaptation.

Diana Garnet (they/any) mentioned how much they love Sharp (don't we all) and also how they used to work at a Barnes and Noble and remembers selling lots of Westerfeld books!

Scott said his approach in writing Leviathan was taking everything he'd always wanted to write about and basically throwing it together, because he was just coming off of the success of Uglies and figured he could get away with it.

If I remember anything else I'll add on to this post! Overall, it was a wonderful panel and I'm incredibly excited for this project.

[toa-archive]

The second part to this Ask, here's all the Krel stuff we have at this current time! Sorry for the delay. System jank mark 3 in a month plus clock change/birthday/mother's day yesterday has done me in.

First up is this poster for 3Below which you might not think much of except...

Yeah Krel's shirt is green for some reason? Given this made it all the way to the poster and one netflix background, his model must have had a last minute change for blue. Very unusual and figured best to include it for the record.

Anyway weirdness aside, the earliest Krel we know about is the artwork in Defenders of Arcadia/3Below credits which uses official Headless studios artwork. This left is screenshot from a youtuber due to not having a screenshot of him handy apart from the ending:

Thanks for that resize tumblr good job.

There is also one other instance from The Animation Magazine. This is spliced together of various assets in the order of:

Francisco Ruiz Velasco - Morando, Fialkov, Coranda and Varvatos Vex

Yingjue Chen - Aja and Krel

Luug - Betsy Bauer

Corgi Luug, Krel, Aja and Vex as an old man however have never shown up anywhere else. It is very possible they are also Headless Studios though they could also be someone else entirely.

Source

Whatever the case is, Krel pops up again in this paint by Yingjue Chen based on the Headless Studios artwork.

Source

The last of the human art we have at the moment is this one by John Bell showing him in his room on a skateboard. He is used as a height reference in multiple of his 3Below pieces.

Source

On the Akiridion side of things, the earliest currently known is this pair by Yingjue Chen. This has been cropped from a larger image for relevance sake.

Source

After that we have this image from a bunch of sketches she did. The rest were heavily Aja leaning or too difficult to be sure so went with this one since yeah that's Krel. Either way ~weaponry~.

Source

This one is part of Alfonso Blaas' portfolio and yeah got nothing, absolutely no idea what this was made in relation to whatsoever. Only possibility ever been able to come up with is something to do with hiding their Akiridion forms but even that's, yeah.

This one is another piece by Alfonso Blaas namely a piece of visual development included as hey, Krel's there.

Source for both the above

Moving back to Francisco Ruiz Velasco a moment, he has this piece of key art from Mother's memory. There are quite a bit of various Akiridion tech in his work but going with being 98% sure it's Krel for this post. The hoverboard might be him for example but they have two arms so eeeeeh.

Source

The last known is this piece of art by Yingjue Chen squirreled on Eli's conspiracy board!

Source

To finish, Krel actually appeared on the Dreamworks 25 years in a unique model pose that has never shown up on any other marketing material.

There is a lot of Aja specific art dotted about including a second version of the above graphic with just her and a model paint. While artists of course can put in their portfolio's whatever they want/get permission for, there is undoubtedly a heavy Aja leaning going on.

Either way hope this helps and if anything else turns up, will sneak them in.

Also went with this screenshot because these three idiots are chaotic it's great.

[slenderfire-blog]

Book review: McCartney Legacy Vols. 1 & 2

I recently finished both of these (giant) books and thought people might like a review. They're definitely worth reading, even if they are long I found the narrative interesting and well-paced. They really benefit from being a collaboration - both authors bringing depth of research and Kozinn especially applying his skills as a long time NYT writer to give the text a fluency and depth that can be lacking from such densely researched tomes.

With that said, this is mostly a relatively surface-level look at what Paul was doing in the years 1969-1980 - the authors generally avoid in-depth psychological analysis. I don't think this is a a bad thing - providing a properly-cited scaffold of what the guy was doing (and it is a LOT) in that period is essential for any future biographies or psychological studies. The detail about every recording session might not be for everyone (I loved it) but it's good that it's included, as making music is the central axis around which everything revolves.

A few key themes that stood out:

Paul's working methods. The main takeaway is SPEED. Countless stories of him going to a gig, talking to someone, reading a book, and then a song coming from it literally within days (sometimes hours). Very move fast, move on. With that said, there's as many stories of him obsessively overdubbing track after track and fiddling endlessly in the studio, driving everyone mad. He seems to create quickly but finish slowly. There's also a lot of material that supports George Martin's quote that 'he doesn't know what his best songs are'. Sometimes he'll work on something minor for weeks, then bash out a classic in days.

Jet-setting lifestyle. While he and Linda had a more homespun image than most, they were always at parties, gigs, foreign holidays, award ceremonies, general fancy things, not to mention travelling to exotic locales to record albums (France, Nigeria, Nashville, LA, New Orleans, British Virgin Islands etc). Nothing unusual about that but maybe not expected because of their version of the Ballad.

MARIJUANA DEPENDENCY. The book doesn't editorialise on this but the sheer volume of smoking going on explains so much about some seemingly inexplicable decisions P&L made during this period. Their level of blaséness about being arrested multiple times is really striking, even for the 70s. I'm not saying it was at the same level as harder drug addiction, but I'm confident in labelling it dependency, probably even more on her part than his. If the story on @menlove 's page recently about P&L spending $1,200 a WEEK on weed is true, they definitely had a problem. Glyn Johns walked out of the RRS sessions because everyone was getting high all the time. I think some parts of Wings' output was negatively affected by stoner brain. Robert Christgau could be a real arsehole but his review that Wings was 'music for potheads' - while overly sweeping and not true of much of it - did contain a germ of truth.

The dichotomy between Paul's genuine efforts to build a new band of equals and the inevitable conflict that arose between them. I don't think he actually wanted a bunch of yes-men, but many factors including his own controlling tendencies, the fact that others would defer by default, and other members' drug and drink addictions made a band impossible to sustain long-term. Also a recurring theme of conflict with other members is Linda's lack of ability, which did improve later tbf, but was never at professional level. The book doesn't provide explanations as to why he insisted on her being in the band (other than what they said themselves about wanting to be together); perhaps it was simply stubbornness and above-mentioned stoner logic. Denny L seems to have lasted as long as he did because he was a bit of a yes-man.

Hostility from critics. Man the press were vicious! Especially the English press. I get not liking some Wings records (I'll never accept Mull of Kintyre, that song is an abomination) but many of the reviews got so personal and bitchy, with the exception of BOTR. As an aside: I've never been able to understand what makes BOTR so qualitatively different to its predecessors. Don't get me wrong, it's a great album, but as far as I can see it has the same strengths and weaknesses as many other Wings albums. I honestly think it was simply the song BOTR that people liked, and that coloured their assessment of the whole album. Similarly, I think part of the reason critics hated Ram was because the single Another Day came out with it (even though its not on the album) and critics hated the 'ditty' single, so wrote off the whole album as 'ditties'. Critics and journalists are very lazy: often when they praise or shit on a work, they're only thinking of the one or two parts that they like or dislike. Anyway, the extensive quotes from angry, bitchy reviews made for some uncomfortable reading. It definitely wasn't just about the music. You can understand why Paul could be so prickly and defensive at times.

Because it's written by men, there isn't much explanation of how they (Linda, really) managed family life on tour. There's lots of examples of the band recording in studio till 4am or P&L going to some event and I'm like WHO'S WATCHING THE KIDS. It seems to have sometimes been the housekeeper Rose, sometimes a friend or two, but I think there must have been more formal or informal 'staff' involved in the kids' rearing than they let on.* I was a bit disturbed by how casual P&L were about taking the kids out of school for long periods, commenting that education 'wasn't so important'. Probably it was better not to be separated, but I don't love the idea of breaking up kids' education in that way. (I know they had tutors but it's not the same). Another thing that can be chalked up to "stoner logic + 1970s", I guess.

There's not a huge amount about the other Beatles but they pop up regularly, especially John. The 1974-75 meetups and rapprochements are covered, no real new detail (except it's suggested that P&L got John's addresses in LA and NYC directly from Yoko, implying that she wasn't necessarily impeding them seeing each other at this time).

The authors don't usually look into the meanings of songs but sometimes they do. The criteria by which they decide to examine a song more deeply, both musically and lyrically, seems arbitrary and based on which songs the authors personally like. Which is fine! You won't get any McLennon here, though they concede Dear Friend and Call Me Back Again as being about John (without going into detail). Again, this is fine, the fact that they usually steer clear of song interpretation is probably a good thing, especially as the detailed timeline allows the reader to identify exactly when certain songs arose and lets them read for themselves about what Paul was doing/reading/listening to when inspiration struck. (No smoking guns in that regard, but interesting from a general perspective into the creative process).

The above-mentioned studio sessions are really well described, and they give a whole new appreciation for the different overdubs and layers involved in building up a song.

There's much more to be said, these are just my overarching impressions. I'd recommend these two books and don't be put off by the size, they're not difficult to read. I got my copies via inter-library loan which I was very glad to as the hardbacks are expensive.

*since writing this review I've seen the below linked account by a coupe of fans of meeting 9yo Heather minding her sisters with seemingly no adult supervision, which raises the possibility that maybe there were times on tour where nobody was watching the kids - not fun to think about :(

http://www.meetthebeatlesforreal.com/2014/11/babysitting-mary.html

[joeybrr9]

Part 4 - Poetic Man

Summary: Aurora continues to work on her new album but might have a new distraction

Warnings: None

a/n: So sorry it took so long for this part to come up. Finals week was KILLING me. So excited for Christmas break. Also, what are we all thinking of this break in at Joe's house???

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

“One more time.” Jack Antenoff was helping Aurora put together her 6th studio album. Jack was well known for creating success all across the music industry; the two first started working together for her album “i used to think i could fly.” Jack reached over and put his headset on, signaling to Aurora that he wanted her to sing her song again. “Alright…..let’s do it from the beginning.”

Aurora heard the music begin and took a deep breath.

“You're so dumb and poetic

It's just what I fall for, I like the aesthetic

Every self-help book, you've already read it

Cherry-pick lines like they're words you invented

Gold star for highbrow manipulation

And "love everyone" is your favorite quotation

Try to come off like you're soft and well-spoken

Jack off to lyrics by Leonard Cohen”

Aurora had very obviously written this song about her past relationship with Paul; it was a song that had become very intimate and personal for her. She hesitated even adding it to the album. Aurora worried once he heard the lyrics she would receive a nasty phone call from his display all his distaste for her work. 

"Don't think you understand

Just 'cause you talk like one doesn't make you a man

You're so sad, there's no communication

But baby, you put us in this situation

You're running so fast from the hearts that you're breakin'

Save all your breath for your floor meditation

You're so empathetic, you'd make a great wife

And I promise the mushrooms aren't changing your life

Will you crash the car and abandon the wreckage?

Fuck with my head like it's some kind of fetish”

Nothing Aurora did in her relationship with Paul was right; whether it was making the wrong dinner plans, flying out to see him on the wrong weekend, interrupting his ‘work time,’ or even just being in his presence, she knew he didn’t want her around. Many people would ask why she stayed with him for so long and there was only one answer, he knew how to manipulate her. When they would have a terrible fight, the next day he would buy her 100 red roses. A big gesture. Love bombing some people would say.

“Don't think you understand

Just 'cause you act like one doesn't make you a man

Don't think you understand

Just 'cause you leave like one doesn't make you a man”

“Honestly Aurora, that might have been the last take.” Jack leaned back with a huge grin plastered to his face high-fiving Mark. Aurora on the other hand felt sick to her stomach, singing such an intimate song had her feelings at an all-time low. She exited the recording booth and was greeted with a bunch of smiling faces. “What’s wrong, we release Espreso in five days and the album is almost done.”

“Speaking of that.” Mark cut Jack off and took a step closer to Aurora. “Have you decided who you want in your music video for your second single? We should probably think about filming it soon.”

“Yeah, I haven’t thought about it yet. Let me get back to you.” She let out a nervous giggle because Mark had already reminded her to pick someone, a month ago. “ Well, on that note I should definitely get going. I have two hungry football players at my house right now.” She quickly tried to grab her stuff without any more interrogations.

“Football players, who is at her house?” Aurora heard Jack but she didn’t have the effort to explain why she had two NFL players staying at her home. 

“I think it’s that Joe Burrows dude and his friend. I don’t know and honestly, I don’t care.” That was all Aurora was able to hear before she let the door close behind her. She got in her car and hit the call button on Ja’Marr’s contact. It only took two quick rings for him to pick up. 

“Hello, my girl. What’s up?”

“I’m heading home right now. Did you guys settle in okay? You didn’t fight him over who gets the bigger room right.” Aurora heard a laugh in the background, assuming it came from Joe her cheeks reddened. 

“No Ma'am we did not start a fight in your home. Did miss you though Rory, thought you said it would only take you a little bit. It’s been five hours. I’m also starving. You don’t keep much food around here, like-”

“Okay Marr I get it, you're a starved man and it’s my fault. I’m only fifteen minutes away so how about we order when I get there, or can you not wait until I get there?”

“I guess, but you better buy some snacks for me. I’m not sure how you survive on wine and ramen noodles.” She let out a little laugh before sighing.

“Snack and dinner. I got it. I’ll be there soon. Love you, Marr.”

“Love you too Rory.” She hung up the phone, taking the exit to her house. Aurora sat in silence in her car, loud silence. For a few moments she thought about calling Ja’Marr back to fill the silent void for the last few minutes of her drive but instead, she pushed the on button to her radio. A random Dua Lipa song filled the car, only making Aurora forget about her thoughts for a couple of minutes. 

Eventually, Aurora pulled into her driveway, seeing her living room lights were on and she could see Joe and Ja’Marr sitting on her couch. A black truck was parked in her driveway, which must have been what the boys rented for the days they were staying in California. She quickly parked her car in the garage and gathered all the stuff to bring inside when she was met with Ja’Marr at the door. 

“Here, let me grab that.” He instantly took everything out of Aurora’s hands. When she was around Ja’Marr he treated her like a queen. “Soooo, I was thinking.”

“Well, that’s never good.” Aurora heard Joe say from the couch. She let out a little laugh.

“Yes Marr, what can I get you to eat tonight? I know I kept you waiting until,” Aurora took a quick glance at the time displayed on her stove, “5:30. Oh my gosh Ja’Marr it’s 5:30. I expected it to be around 7.”

“When I’m hungry, I’m hungry. Sorry girl.” Ja’Marr put his arm around Aurora as the two walked over to the couch. Joe was sitting comfortably watching Spongebob on the TV. 

“Okay boys, what do we want? Pizza, Chinese, Italian, In-N-Out, or Mexican? All of that sounds really good to me so you can choose. Aurora exchanged glances between Joe and Ja’Marr until Joe finally spoke up.

“Pizza sounds good to me.”

“What kind are we getting?” Ja’Marr wasn’t too concerned with the food. He was too busy watching the content displayed on the TV.

“What about pepperoni and sausage?” Joe and Aurora said at the same time. She felt a blush grace her cheeks as she smiled at him. 

“Yeah I’ll order it now-”

“No, I got it. You don’t need to be paying for our food when you’re already letting us stay here for free. I got it.” Joe left to go call in a pizza, leaving just Ja’Marr and Aurora. 

Aurora could see Ja’Marr looking at her out of the corner of her eye. “Instead of staring at me Marr, why don’t you just say whatever you want to?” He chuckled awkwardly, rubbing his jaw.

“Me and Burrow were talking today. About you. A little bit. Not the whole time. Don’t let it get to your big head.” He gave a gentle push to Aurora’s shoulder making her giggle. “He mentioned that Tee sent him your interview. He seemed to think it was funny, in a cute way. Don’t be embarrassed Rory, he thinks you're cool.” She looked over to her left where Joe was standing in the doorway of her library on the phone. He hadn’t said much, or anything at all, to her since she got home.

“That interview got kinda out of hand. I’m embarrassed he even saw that.”

“You don’t listen. He thinks you’re a cool girl.” Ja’Marr wrapped his arm around Aurora pulling her into him. She was a little curious if Joe was still dating his long-term girlfriend from college. It had been reported a couple times that they had split but Aurora wanted to know from an inside source.

“Um, would he happen to still be dating that one girl from college? Not that I care or anything. I just see a lot of stuff on TikTok. You know.” Real Smooth Aurora. Ja’Marr looked down at the blonde girl with a cheesy grin.

“They did in fact break up. It was all on good terms. Joe is a very focused guy when it comes to football. Not sure that’s what she wanted. Sometimes he needed his space and they couldn’t agree on it. No bad blood as far as I’m concerned.” Aurora nodded her head. “So yes, he is single, Rory.” Ja’Marr poked her sides making her squirm and move away from him. 

“I got three pizzas and an order of breadsticks. Also, Aurora, I noticed you have a lot of wine in your cabinets so I ordered some wine too. Hope you don’t mind.” Joe took his original spot next to Aurora on the couch.

“I could never mind someone buying me wine; that was very thoughtful of you.” She flashed the quarterback a quick smile. 

“Pizza should be here in about 35 minutes.” Joe looked between Aurora and Ja’Marr.

“Did you guys want to put on a movie until then? The group decided to watch The Hangover until the pizza arrived. One of Ja’Marr’s favorite movies.

“Bro, did you see that tiger?” Ja’Marr was clutching his stomach from laughter. Aurora had stood up to get the pizza that just arrived.

“Yes, Marr. We all saw it. I’m pretty sure you’ve seen it about a thousand times too.” Aurora disappeared for about two minutes coming back with all the food. “Alright boys, I’ll let you get yours first.” She set out plates for everyone and a glass for her wine. 

“Here,” Joe reached over to open the bottle of wine he ordered and opened it. “Let me get this for you.” He poured her a glass and got her a couple slices of pizza.

“Um, thanks.” Aurora grabbed the gestures from Joe and made her way back to the couch to finish their movie with dinner. As she was walking back to the couch she overhead Ja’Marr and Joe.

“Try hard?” Ja’Marr scoffed as he grabbed a beer out of the fridge.

“Dude, she’s just a nice girl. I’m not gonna be rude to someone who’s letting me stay in their house for free. I’ve never met her before either. Good first impressions.”

“You sure it’s nothing else loverboy?” 

“Yes, I’m 100% percent sure. I’m focused on football, not girls.” Joe laughed. Even though there wasn’t anything going on between Joe and Aurora, she couldn’t help but feel disappointed. She hadn’t been able to move on since Paul and a very small part of her thought Joe would possibly be that person for her. It was a stupid thought anyway. 

Joe and Ja’Marr joined Aurora on the couch to enjoy their pizza dinner and movie. Ja’Marr was able to eat 10 slices of pizza while Joe only had 6. Aurora stuck to her original 2 slices with a bread stick. 

“Sorry to cut the night short but I’m gonna head to bed. Sleep good Rory. Night man.” Ja’Marr ruffled Aurora’s hair and dabbed up Joe. The two were left alone on the couch with the ending credits of The Hangover displayed on her TV. 

After a long couple minutes of awkward silence, Joe cleared his throat. “So Ja’Marr tells me you are working on your sixth album. That’s a pretty big deal.” Aurora took a big drink of her wine finishing off the glass.

“Uh yeah, I am. It should be out sometime this summer. I’m really excited to release another album.”

“He told me you won Album of the Year at The Grammy’s last year. That’s huge. Congrats, I know it’s a little late.” Joe chuckled. 

She swished around whatever was left of her wine. “Yeah, you know, you do something incredible like that and you feel like you need to live up to those expectations again. I just don’t want to let anyone down. I have an amazing producer and if I don’t win another Grammy with this next album I know I won’t only be letting myself down, it will also be hurting him.”

Aurora looked over at Joe and by the look on his Face she knew he wasn’t sure what to say to her singer/songwriter trauma. “Can I get you another glass of wine?” Aurora debated before she answered his question. Did he want to down here talking to her? This would be her third glass of wine.

“Yeah, sure.” Joe hopped up from the couch and walked over to the kitchen. Aurora couldn’t help but observe him in person. He was a good-looking guy; even better in person. 

“Here you go. Tell me more about yourself. How did you get your start in music?” Joe got himself comfortable on the couch; showing Aurora he had no plans of heading to bed anytime soon.

“My first album was “Singular Act I,” so that was obviously my big start. My huge single off of that album was Sue Me. Have you ever heard it?”

“Uhhhh, I don’t think so. Don’t hate me.” Joe laughed, making Aurora crack a smile.

“No hurt feelings. One day I just started posting videos of myself singing on Youtube and it started blowing up. Eventually, a record label contacted me and they wanted to produce a single. Fun fact, it wasn’t Sue Me.”

“Do I get to hear this legendary single?” Joe smirked at Aurora.

“Absolutely not. I like to brush that song under the rug. I never-”

“You know if you don’t play it for me right now I’ll just look it up later. Matter of fact, let’s look it up right now.” Joe pulled his phone out of his pocket and started typing something into Google. Aurora jumped up from her spot on the couch to move closer to Joe.

“Joe stop, I hate that song. I’m not kidding. Listen to it later, not right now.” Aurora reached for Joe’s phone the second she heard the beginning verse to Thumbs playing out of the speakers. “JOE, stop it right now.” Aurora couldn’t contain her laughter at this point. She was leaning over him, grasping for the phone.

“And the bank robbed the people, so the people robbed the bank.” Joe sang along, laughing in Aurora’s face. She took one more reach for his phone, failing, before falling back beside him. After the song ended Joe tuned toward the blonde girl.

“Honestly, I was expecting worse. Not sure what skidledeee deee dat dum means but I can roll with it. Definitely added to my warm-up playlist.” Joe gave Aurora a cheesy smile before bursting out laughing.

“I fucking hate you.” 

Aurora and Joe sat on the couch and talked until 2 am while Aurora drank, not one, but two, bottles of wine. She definitely would feel that in the morning. Joe knew that as the night whet on Aurora had become wine drunk and nothing she said he could take too seriously. She did tell him he had the most beautiful eyes she had ever seen, and that the curl in his hair was his best feature. Around two thirty Aurora passed out on Joe's lap while watching How To Train Your Dragon.

Joe carried Aurora up to her room while also trying to figure out which one was hers. When they finally made it there and he had tucked her into bed; it was time for his escape. He felt her hand grasp his wrist. 

“Can you please stay? Please Joe, just this once.” Aurora hardly opened her eyes but that was all the convincing Joe needed to stay.

[hooked-on-elvis]

I'm shocked (not really, but it's shocking to hear this anyway) to learn that at some point in life Priscilla sued Marty Lacker for a money Elvis gave him. She dropped the lawsuit when Marty counterclaimed it. Marty says "She messed with the wrong guy, but she was trying to use me as a test case against the other guys. She is a lovely person."

(1) February 25-26, 1965: Elvis signing autographs for fans in Nashville while he was in town for the recording session for the "Harum Scarum" movie soundtrack. Marty Lacker is seen by Elvis' side.

YOUTUBE - INTERVIEW WITH MARTY LACKER BY JOE KREIN PART 3 (out of 4) (go to 30:00 to listen his story about the lawsuit by Priscilla)

Now, this is just my personal comments on this but for all I've learned about Marty Lacker so far I believe he had the best interests at heart concerning Elvis. He helped EP with his music career A LOT. The way he puts it, it seems he worried with Elvis' name in the business because: 1. Marty knew EP had so much to offer (as everybody else knew), so much talent to go to waste on unworthy movies and its soundtracks and on general commercially weak songs, and 2. I bet it wasn't funny to see people mocking his friend for the kind of music and movies Elvis was making. Marty, as well as some other Memphis Mafia guys, worried about Elvis' personal satisfaction and well-being for multiple reasons... maybe not all of them being selfless but I still believe they did care about Elvis as a friend and human being even if they had hidden interests and whatever was the nature of them.

Now, all of those guys (all the people) around EP were seeing him killing himself little by little while trying to numb the disturbing thoughts in his mind and the sorrow in his soul... they were witnessing all of the sad incidents happening over the years where Elvis would end up hurting himself or almost dead. Marty was one of the few people that would go against Colonel Parker when he convinced Elvis to try something new for his career, something that would end up giving Elvis a great refreshing moment in his life, something he was hoping for deep down but somehow couldn't imagine how to make it happen himself and the ones who were in the place to advice him were too busy with their own personal agendas to care about the King's aspirations for his career.

Marty was the one to manage getting Elvis into the American Sound studio (later at the Stax too), and Marty was also the one to recommend the Sweet Inspirations to work on Elvis' concerts. Just by that alone, ALONE, could you really think Marty deserved a lawsuit for a money Priscilla didn't even need? I mean, where is the gratitude to some of the close friends of the man she allegedly says she loved?

As he said in the same interview, Marty was no saint… he wasn't a leech either. There was a time when Elvis lent him some money and Marty paid him back some time later, so Elvis was deeply touched by it because normally no one would pay him back ever! That shows something, right?

Maybe I don't know enough yet because I'm relatively a new born in the Elvis fandom, and I absolutely don't agree with every statement I've listened/read coming from Marty but in general I see him as one of the good guys from the Memphis Mafia bunch. I mean, every story has two sides. Maybe Priscilla sued Marty after being counselled to do so by some lawyer she had, like she was when she decided take Elvis to the court again in 1973, asking for more money after the divorce settlement had been set in 1972 - and by this I mean she could've been convinced to sue Marty instead of having the idea herself, which at least would make things a little less awful. But any reason she had to do that, I mean... why? There's things in life we just don't do. Even if she didn't personally liked the guy (and we know from Elvis' friends the ones she really liked were Joe Esposito and Jerry Schilling), she had to admit Marty was a great contributor to the Elvis Presley estate from which she benefits until today. I think for all Marty did for Elvis' career it's reasonable to think that any money he could've borrowed from EP would have already made its way back into the Presley's bank account in other ways. Maybe a little bit of gratitude and respect to him wouldn't hurt. I mean, I'm not totally against Priscilla... in some ways I can understand her, I really can, but not on this. Not when it comes to her greediness.

I just wonder what would Elvis think.

(2) The Presley's wedding day, February 1, 1967. Marty with Elvis and Priscilla.

FURTHER INFO: On July 17 1973, "in the papers presented to the court Priscilla's new attorney seeks to set aside the original divorce settlement." - Excerpt from 'Elvis Day by Day' by Peter Guralnick and Ernst Jorgensen. Now in addition to what has been agreed on the August 1972 divorce settlement, from the 1973 new settlement Priscilla would also receive, among other things, Spousal support, additional $625,000 (in cash) to the original $100.000 agreed and 5% of Elvis' royalties.

[ourpickwickclub]

PART 2

I took a look at the rest of the original ask, and realized that if I broke up the Chronology Guide to add to each date with the quotes, then some of them would exceed 4,096 characters, so for the sake of at least preserving all the quotes from one day in a singular post, I decided to just keep the Chronology Guide intact, and you guys can just refer back to it if needed.

CHRONOLOGY GUIDE:

2/15/2025

Pandora Takeover/Audacy On the Record will be first since he recorded that in Vegas with Katie Neal, and we know this thanks to the video clip that Audacy posted on IG on 5/12/2025 of him from the same/place/outfit as that Audacy Totally Private Event, discussing one of the answers he gave for On the Record and the Pandora Takeover, which were identical, except for a bunch of extra answers on Pandora unrelated to his album.

3/18/2025 - 3/19/2025

American Songwriter, Today, Access Hollywood interviews that he did in Nashville the day before and day of the Opry100.

4/2/2025

Interviews he did at the last The Road taping at the Ryman in Nashville. (People, ET/CBS) We saw the ET/CBS videos of him at the Ryman, and People published photos of him and Keith Urban filming the last episode of the Ryman, that were posted on the articles about BG that were published in the weeks leading up to album release.

4/4/2025

These are all those Country Radio interviews (CCUSA, CNLWBR, BSCWE, KN&Co, 90sCWHF - the full names of the radio shows will be written out with the quotes) he did from the ranch in that blue shirt, as Katie Neal revealed at the very beginning of her interview with B (in the full Audacy audio interview, not the edited youtube video version) that she had just seen Gwen the night before (4/3/2025) at the Audacy Leading Ladies event, and she said everyone there was asking if B would be there, and she was telling them B would not be there, because he had a big press day the next day, and then B said actually he was babysitting the boys the night before, while G went to work in NY. Then Katie said that was the first time she had seen Gwen live and she was incredible, and B said "Gwen is magical, she really is." and that is right before the YT video version of the interview begins.

4/14/2025

Nashville interviews - at least 4 shirt changes that day (CMT, Amazon Live, Country Heat Weekly - from the Amazon studios in Nashville, as seen in their video clips, B is wearing the same shirt he wore while signing his albums in Nashville that day, even though they kinda tried to make it sound like they did it AFTER the ACMs, since they weren't airing it til afterwards.) This was also the same day as the iHeartCountry Music Summit that BG attended, when B talked about G listening to LHIA over and over again. Michelle also posted some bts that day on IG of the green screen and studio where they filmed the CMT interview.

4/25/2025

These are all the Canadian and Australian interviews he did in LA, wearing the burgundy colored shirt and we know this because Richard Wilkins from the Today Show Australia posted about arriving at TMZ headquarters in LA from Australia on 4/25/2025, and he conducted a couple US interviews, both in person and remotely that day wearing that same suit from his interview with B.

5/6/2025

Pre-ACM interviews with blue shirt and cap - There were a bunch of country radio interviews at the press junket, but the Today's Country with Kelleigh Bannen on Apple is only one that had substantial Shefani content imo.

5/13/2025-5/14/2025

NYC interviews with Shefani content: The Today Show and Access Hollywood.

.

[nattinatalia]

URBAN WYATT X HARLOW SIS : STUDIO TIME

A/N : My timelines are all over the place with this universe so just enjoy. Also, this is where Jack and Clay find out they’re dating 🙊 A huge shoutout to my bestie westie @harlowcomehome for helping me with this.!!!!!!

⚠️ Warning : SMUT AHEAD 18+ ONLY!

“No, no, no.” Jack groans.

“Y/N act right and stop making moaning sounds.” Clay shutters, rolling his eyes.

“I’m not a singer so I don’t know what you want me to do.” You tell them, sitting down on the chair they had inside the booth.

When your brothers invited you to spend the day with them, you didn’t know it would be in the studio or that they would ask you to try to sing a verse to one of Jack’s new songs.

“You’re not supposed to sing, just read it off normal.”

You raise your eyebrows immediately, “Then why does Jack always does that annoying deep voice?”

“I DO NOT.”

Clay laughs, “I’m sorry bro, but she got you there because you do.”

He rolls his eyes. “Whatever, just do the damn verse.”

The door to the studio opens and once you see who it is, you start getting warm all over your body.

“Urb, please help me with her.” Jack exclaims dramatically.

“What did she do now?”

You gasp and face Urban. “Excuse me? I’m not that bad.”

He smirks “Sorry, little one, but you are.”

“Stop calling me little one.” You mumble out, looking down at the piece of paper Jack had handed you.

“Why do you want me to sing this verse anyway? Don’t you have a bunch of little side chicks who would love to be in your little album?”

Jack rolls his eyes, “Clay helps me with the beats, you help me with the chorus. I thought it would be a cool sibling thing to do. But if you don’t want to, you can leave.”

“She wants to do it. She’s just nervous.” Urban speaks up. “Why don’t you two go get some fresh air and I’ll stay here with her.”

“Leave you two alone?.” Clay chuckles. “So you two can kill each other? No thanks.”

“We’re two grown adults, we can put our childhood rivalry aside.” Urban shrugs, taking a sip of his water.

“Okay, fine. I need a little distraction.” Jack says, he grabs his keys and phone. “You know what button to push to record right?”

“Yes.”

“Alright, we’ll be back.”

“Take your time.” You yell out.

Both your brothers walk out the door, but not without giving a double look at both Urban and you.

You quickly take off the headphones you were wearing and stand up.

“Soo.” Urban starts, walking into the little space of the booth. “Need a little distraction?”

You smile, “Get over here and kiss me.”

Urban held his finger up to his lips to shush you, worried your brothers would overhear.

“They can’t hear us over their own thoughts” You rolled your eyes as Urban walked toward you.

He starts placing soft wet kisses against your neck and collarbone, you closed your eyes as you moaned into his ear. The smell of weed and cologne filling the air, only made you want him more.

“Babe, they’re outside” you breathed against him.

“Then we better make it quick” he whispered before grabbing you by the waist and placing you against the soundboard.

Your skirt made it easy for him, using his warm hand to spread your legs.

“Urb- be careful. Jack will kill us if we-“

“Don’t mention your brother when I’m face to face with your vagina” Urban groaned before letting out a soft laugh.

The palms of your hands rested against the soundboard as you threw your head back. Urban took his time against your folds, flicking his tongue quickly against you as your legs trembled.

“Holy fuck- I can’t. I can’t. I need you” you started to babble.

Urban didn’t wait, taking that as his signal. He crawled on top of you, as best as he could without putting his weight on anything.

“There!” You pointed to the studio couch, not wanting to wait another minute.

Urban picked you up, slapping your butt before moving to the couch. He dug in his pockets for a condom, ripping the edge of the wrapper with his teeth before hurriedly sliding it on.

You both let out a moan louder than intended as you took his length.

“We have to be fast” you moaned between thrusts.

“Don’t worry, I will be” he laughed as your moans only grew louder. He knew that you weren’t able to control your noise level, something he loved about you.

It only took a few minutes before you panicked, pulling Urban by the hair to kiss you. Your muffled moans escaped inside his mouth as the two of you orgasmed one after the other.

***************

After your little distraction, you and Urban actually decided on working on the chorus your brother wanted you to do.

You were both laughing about something random, when your brothers walked in.

“Well I’m surprised both of you are still alive.” Clay says.

You shrug, “We don’t actually hate each other you know that right?”

Jack rolls his eyes, “Yeah we know, you two share some sibling love.”

You start to cough, “Hmm not really.” You say between coughs, trying to play it off that you got disgusted by your brother's comment.

“Anyway.” Urban starts. “She was able to do the verse. It’s all recorded so you can listen to it.” He says as he sits down next to you on the couch that was across the room.

Clay and Jack make their way to the table where all the different buttons are. What are they for? You had no idea that’s why you didn’t dare mess with their stuff.

“Alright, let’s hear what you got.”

“Don’t mention your brother when I’m face to face with your vagina” Urban groaned before letting out a soft laugh.

“Urb- be careful. Jack will kill us if we-“

“Holy fuck- I can’t. I can’t. I need you” you started to babble.

“WHAT THE FUCK?” Both Clay and Jack yell.

Urban and you immediately stand up, you run towards your brothers and start pushing random buttons so the recording could stop playing against the speakers.

You turn around to face your brothers, face red with embarrassment. “I-I can explain that.”

“Explain what? That you made a porno with my best friend?” Jack yells.

“Don’t be dramatic, we didn’t do it on purpose.” You tell him.

“OKAY SO EXPLAIN TO US WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT?”

“Dude, relax so we can talk about thi-“

“Do not tell me to relax when I just heard my best friend and little sister having sex.” Jack yells.

“Technically, we weren’t having sex yet, he was just-“

“Y/N.” Clay yells.

“Babe.” Urban says, shaking his head.

“BABE? WHAT THE FUCK DO YOU MEAN BABE?” Jack starts getting red on the face.

Clay glares at Urban, “Are you two together, together? Or what the hell is going on?”

You nod, “We’re together.”

“Since when?” Jack snaps.

Urban starts scratching at his neck with nerves, but answers anyway, “Her birthday party.”

“We went official after my birthday party.” You shrug.

“Which one? The LA one or the one mom threw?”

“Does it matter? They’ve been dating for months and hid it from everyone. What is mom going to say?” Jack asks, he does a double take, “Mom knows doesn’t she?”

“She has her suspicions, but I haven’t confirmed anything yet.”

Jack shakes his head, glaring at both Urban and you. “YOU TWO KEPT THIS FROM ME. MY BEST FRIEND AND MY LITTLE SISTER, HOW DO YOU THINK THAT MAKES ME FEEL?”

“Dude I know it feels shitty finding out the way that you did. I wanted to tell you sooner but your sister-“ You elbow Urban in the ribs

It’s your turn to glare at your boyfriend, “Yes me, I didn’t want to tell my two annoyingly over protective brothers that I was dating one of their friends. I knew how you were gonna react so I wanted time to see where it’ll go and see if there was a way to smoothly tell you about it.”

“This shit is so fucked up, what we heard, no sibling should ever hear that. You two going at it in my work space.” Jack shakes his head in disgust.

“Y/N” Clay starts. “Go home.”

You furrow your eyebrows, “Don’t tell me what to do Clayborn. Let me explain-“

Jack scoffs, “I don’t want to hear a word from you, if anything Urb can speak for you. But you’re my sister, you knew from the start that my friends were off limits and you crossed that line anyway.”

“Your rule was a stupid rule and you did it only because you noticed I had a crush on him since middle school.” You roll your eyes.

“Can you just leave please? Can you do that?”

“Jackman-“ you start

Urban grabs a hold of your hand. “Babe, let’s just go.”

Jack chuckles, shaking his head, glaring at our hands intertwined together. “She can go, we need to work.”

You roll your eyes, “Okay. I’ll see you guys tomorrow for the show.”

Jack stands up, “No you won’t, I don’t want you coming anymore.”

It’s Urban’s turn to glare at Jack, “Dude come on.”

“She knew what she was doing. I told her plenty of times not to cross that line and she did it anyway. I’m pissed, I have every right to be.” He snaps.

“Just so you know, I didn’t do it to spite you.” You sigh before continuing.

“I tried really fucking hard to follow your idiotic rule, to stay away from him. I fucking moved away from home because I couldn’t handle not being with him the way I wanted to be. I thought with time and with you being an adult, you’d realize it was childish to begin with but I was wrong. You’ll always fault me for loving him and that’s too bad because I know deep down, I’ll never stop and you’ll never be okay with it and I guess I have to live with that.”

Urban turns your way to look at you, “Baby.” He says it so sympathetic, and you know just then how really down you were for him.

You shake your head. “Stay, do what you have to do here and I’ll see you later.” You squeeze his hand before letting it go and walking out the room without any other word.

Urban sighs and looks at Jack and Clay. “I crossed a line, I know that.” He continues. “But it’s also unfair that you knew of our feelings for each other and your solution was to say we were off limits.”

“You’re my best friend.” Jack scoffs.

“And she’s your sister.” Urban exclaims.

“Is she though?” Jack shrugs. “If she would be my blood sister, she wouldn’t have betrayed me like that.”

“Jack.” Clay warns.

Urban immediately starts getting annoyed. “That’s fucked up what you’re even trying to say.”

Jack shrugs, “I’m pissed off, I’m allowed to say what I want.”

“Not when shit like that can hurt her.”

“Can we just get back to work?” Jack asks.

“What do you need me here for? Because the last thing I want is to be here while you talk down about my girlfriend.” Urban snaps.

Clay sighs, “Go check up on her, I got it down here.”

“No-“ Jack starts but gets cut off by the glare Clay throws at him. “Fine, go.”

Urban starts walking towards the door but stops halfway to look at his best friend. “Like she said, we tried really hard not to act out on our feelings. You were always her first concern, even if it meant hurting me in the process. That girl, your sister, man she’s it for me and I know you won’t believe me because of my past, but what she said, made me realize that Y/N and I? We’re endgame and it’ll be disappointing if you can’t forgive us and accept it. I love her and I’m not hiding it anymore.”

With those last words, Urban walks out leaving the two brothers alone to think and process everything that just happened.

*************

TAG LIST

@heavyhitterheaux @harlowsbby @arination99 @cmalass @jackharloww @minkookie95 @deannaard @jacksmoviestar @harlowcomehome @fdl305 @httpkoylinnn @xoxokiaraaxoxo @hoodharlow @automaticpeachsong @amethyst09 @aliciacat20 @allyson15 @gabbylovesreading @stefansalvatoresgf @violetdreamsworld @carma-fanficaddict @jasminxts @itsaaliyah2 @itsyagirljaz @harrycanyonmoonn @neon-lights-and-glitter @awhore4moree @toocriticalharlow @thefemalestorywriter @lightsoutstyles @violetslays818 @fantasywritersstuff @vanwritesfan-fiction

[stylesclarified]

Harry and Louis... lived together? - Part I

I got a question asking me to debunk a bunch of Larrie myths. I answered half of them in the ask itself, and you can find that here, but one of the things I was asked to debunk was this:

3) why Harry moved in with Louis?

This idea that Harry and Louis lived together—the whole Princess Park thing, the alleged domesticity, and the romantic framing of it all—has been a long-held belief among Larries.

It’s wrong, of course. It’s entirely based on taking things out of context and making a lot of ridiculous assumptions. But debunking it means I have to untangle the web of lies told by Larries one by one and show you what actually happened.

I think the best way to do that is with a sort of timeline of events, with some side notes here and there to clarify specific things. Let’s go.

Summer 2010

Harry and Louis both auditioned for The X Factor, where they were later put into One Direction, in the summer of 2010.

Harry’s family was from the north west of England—Holmes Chapel, Cheshire. Meanwhile, Louis’s was from a town about two hours away—Doncaster, South Yorkshire.

The X Factor held auditions in a bunch of cities across the UK and Ireland. The one closest to both of their hometowns was Manchester.

Here you can see both counties in relation to Manchester and London:

[Zayn also auditioned in Manchester. He was from Bradford, which is in West Yorkshire—the county just above South Yorkshire on the map.]

The guys did individual auditions in June and were put through to the first stage of the show, called “Bootcamp,” which lasted about two weeks in July. By the end of Bootcamp, they were eliminated as solo artists but offered the chance to continue as a band—which they took. After that, in late July or early August, they moved on to the next stage: “Judges’ Houses,” where they auditioned as a group with the rest of the bands at Simon Cowell’s house. They made it through and advanced to what’s known as the “Live Shows.”

The first auditions, Bootcamp, and Judges’ Houses were all taped in advance. They aired during the first few weeks of the show, which began broadcasting on August 21st. The Live Shows, as the name suggests, were live, airing every weekend from October 9 through December 12, with contestants being eliminated weekly. Since One Direction made it to the final (where they came in third), they stayed for the entire competition.

Mid-September - Mid-December, 2010

One Direction moved into The X Factor house—which was located in London, near the studio where the Live Shows were filmed—a few weeks before those shows began airing in mid-September. The X Factor house was where the contestants lived while they were part of the show.

For perspective: Harry’s first time in London was during Bootcamp, so moving into the X Factor house marked only his second time ever setting foot in the city. He was 16. Louis was 18.

Mid-December 2010 - Mid-January, 2011

As I said, One Direction came in third, but they were still offered a record deal. The deal was with Syco, the record label tied to The X Factor’s production. That contract was signed the day after the show ended—December 13, 2010. I went over this contract in my post debunking the idea that Harry “backstabbed” his bandmates.

Afterwards, the guys returned to their hometowns and stayed there for the rest of December, aside from a couple of one-off shows in Scotland at the end of the month.

They also spent the first few days of January 2011 back home with their families.

-----

FIRST ASIDE: Larries take things out of context

The video below was recorded on February 28th, 2012, and posted a few weeks later on 1D’s official YouTube channel. In it, Harry introduces himself and the band. The video was made for VEVO LIFT. To understand what he’s saying—and why—we need to explain what VEVO LIFT is. Naturally, Larries never bothered doing that.

VEVO was a company created by Sony Music and Universal Music Group—two of the “Big Three” record labels (Warner Music Group, the third, joined in 2016). The name stands for “Video EVOlution,” and the company was launched to tackle copyright issues on YouTube, which was quickly becoming a go-to platform for music videos.

VEVO LIFT was a promotional series for up-and-coming artists. It featured performances and introductory videos designed to launch these artists to larger audiences. When One Direction recorded their VEVO LIFT content, they hadn’t yet released their debut album in America and were opening for Big Time Rush.

VEVO LIFT was 100% scripted. You can even tell in Harry’s interview that he’s answering off-camera questions that have been edited out. Each band member had to give a quick intro about themselves, the group, their role in it, etc. It was a way for new fans—mostly American—to get to know the band better.

Of course, Larries completely ignore that context when they analyze what Harry says in the video.

Considering they believe Evil Management™ wanted to closet them—and that this closet supposedly tightened when they started trying to break into America—this video directly contradicts everything they claim.

This is a transcript of what Harry says, but you can watch the video below:

“I was in a band—we were called White Eskimo. There was a battle of the bands competition at school and we formed just for that and we ended up winning.

I went to The X Factor just to get an honest opinion—if I was any good or not. It was something I’d grown up watching, so for me to be on it was crazy.

When they said that we should be put in a band I was completely upfront. You know, everyone enters the competition trying to get as far as they can. Either we left the competition as solo artists or we carried on in a group.

The fans call me and Louis Larry Stylinson because we get on really well. Since we started in The X Factor House, me and Louis had always said that we wanted to move in together. That was pretty much it—it just kinda happened.

I actually really like London. Before The X Factor I hadn’t even been to London, and now I’m living there, which is pretty crazy.”

So what were the questions he was responding to in order to give those answers?

First question: most likely something like What’s your background in music? What did you do before The X Factor and 1D?

Second question: Why did you audition for The X Factor?

Third question: How did you end up in a band if you auditioned solo? What did that feel like?

Fourth question: What’s the deal with “Larry Stylinson”? You and Louis live together?

Fifth question: How do you feel about living in London?

To glean something romantic from this, you really have to do the absolute most. He’s directly answering a question about his friendship with Louis—just like he’s answering the other questions. This video was recorded and posted by One Direction’s official team—the same team that Larries claim was forcing them into the closet, making them interact less, and faking relationships with women. Larries… you cannot have it both ways. Either management was an evil closet-enforcing overlord, or Harry was not only allowed to openly talk about moving in with Louis in official promotional content, but encouraged to do so.

Go watch Louis’ interview for this same VEVO LIFT series. It follows the same structure: he talks about getting the Danny Zuko role at school, then auditioning for The X Factor, then getting put into the group. He doesn’t bring up “Larry” because Harry already did in his video—Louis instead gets asked about What Makes You Beautiful, their debut single.

Now look at Zayn’s interview. He doesn’t seem to have—or want to share—anything about his musical background, so when he’s asked about life before The X Factor, he just says he was shy and didn’t do much, but that the show helped him. He also talks about why he auditioned, what it was like being put into the band, and then about his style and love of comic books.

The first three questions seem to be the same across the board, while the last two rotate depending on the person.

So with all that in mind… let’s analyze the weird-ass mind of Larries.

What they get from this video is twofold.

First, Harry says, “We said we wanted to live together since we first moved into The X Factor House.” Larries never pause to consider the context of it. Do you really think that, at 16 years old, Harry—who had literally just met Louis—was so head-over-heels in love that he decided he wanted to move in with him? Have you ever met a sixteen-year-old boy? Does that sound like their thought process? And even if that were the case, would it line up with something he’d later casually share in a public interview, all while being forced to fake relationships with women twice his age? In an official promo piece, run by the very same team that was supposedly shoving him into the closet?

What if instead of filtering every single moment through fanfiction goggles, we just look at what Harry said like normal people? Two teenage boys from working-class families, both from outside London, both absolutely stunned to be given a shot at something bigger than they’d ever dreamed of. Maybe they just thought, “If this X Factor thing doesn’t pan out, we should still move to London and try to make it work.” Wouldn’t that make a lot more sense?

The second thing they cling to is the line: “That was pretty much it—it just kinda happened.” They wave this around like it’s some profound romantic confession. In reality, Harry is simply explaining that, because they had talked about living together back in the X Factor House, they followed through. When it came time to pick roommates, they picked each other. That’s it. That’s all. The whole quote is only romantic if your brain is running on AO3 logic 24/7.

But don’t worry, we’ll dig deeper into that later.

Let’s continue with the timeline.

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Mid-January - Mid-February, 2011

For most editions of The X Factor, the contestants who made it to the Live Shows went on a tour across the UK and Ireland that lasted about two months. Each contestant performed a couple of covers at every concert.

Because they were getting ready for this tour, the guys had to head down to London to rehearse. During this period, they stayed in hotels. Towards the end of January, they also traveled to LA for about a week—likely to start working on their debut album—then returned to London to continue rehearsing.

February 19th - April 9th, 2011

You can find a detailed breakdown of the entire X Factor Tour here. It ran from February 19th to April 9th, with very few days off in between. During this time, they were staying in hotels all over the UK and Ireland.

Despite the fact that Louis had been dating a girl named Hannah since March 2010—so, before joining One Direction—he met a girl called Eleanor during the Manchester stops of this tour (around March). Eleanor was a university roommate of Alana Burton, a girl who used to work with Harry at a bakery before he was famous and became friends with him. Harry invited Alana to the show, and she brought some of her roommates—Eleanor included. This story has been corroborated by multiple sources, including Louis himself. I talked about this before, but I’ll go over it in more detail later in this post and link my in-depth analysis there.

Louis would continue dating Hannah for a few more months. She visited him on tour and would post pictures of them together sporadically. It’s not really the point of this post, so I won’t go into detail unless it becomes relevant.

Harry was also linked to a few girls during these months, but nothing too serious, so I’m not really going to talk about it, for the most part.

Here’s One Direction performing Grenade by Bruno Mars at The X Factor Tour in Aberdeen. Because why not?

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SECOND ASIDE: the many Larrie lies

Larries have a habit of making wild assumptions and filling in the blanks with whatever best suits their fanfiction-fueled fantasies. Unsurprisingly, the whole “living together” topic is no exception.

A couple of tweets from Louis’ mom have been used to build an absolutely bonkers narrative by a bunch of Larries.

The first one is this tweet, sent while the guys were still on The X Factor Tour:

A lot of Larries—but one in particular, who I’ll get to in a minute—decided this tweet confirmed a fantasy. They assumed that:

“The boys” = Harry and Louis

“Their flat” = the apartment they were planning to move into together

“It” = Louis’ things.

So basically, the belief was: Louis' stuff was being stored at Harry’s mom’s house while they were on tour, and once the tour was over, Louis and Harry would move in together and put “his stuff” in their shared flat.

Let’s unpack this mess.

First of all, who decided that “it” meant “Louis’ stuff”? Where are we pulling that from? It didn’t mean that. And it’s not hard to find out what it actually was.

“It” = a painting. A fan-made painting. Fan art.

How do I know that? Because there’s another tweet from the same day, replying to the same fan account, that literally says:

This fan, Ellie, and a friend of hers called Hann, made a bunch of scrapbooks and paintings for the 1D guys and Olly Murs. Here’s her friend tweeting about making a painting for Liam with Ellie and handing it to him at the X Factor Tour show in Newcastle.

Now to the second point, “The boys” did not mean “Harry and Louis,” as Larries were assuming. It meant One Direction—as in, the entire band.

At first I was willing to give this the benefit of the doubt that it meant specifically Harry and Louis, because Johannah is the one answering and she’s saying “it” is at Anne’s. So Harry and Louis’ moms.

But then I found this:

Remember when Ellie’s friend said that they’d given the band the paintings in Newcastle? Do you know when One Direction was in Newcastle? March 26th. The same day that One Direction’ official account tweeted at Ellie and her friend Hann thanking them for the painting and included a photo of it. Sadly, the photo is no longer available. Of course, the 1D account could be just tweeting a painting of Harry and Louis, right?

Sure, but they didn’t.

When Johannah tweeted that “their flat” tweet, this was the reaction from fans:

The 1D boys, not Harry and Louis. Fans who saw the painting in real time as Johannah replied to that fan said “the 1D boys.”

But I wasn’t satisfied with that, and after a lot of digging through old blogs, I actually found the fucking painting.

The watermark is no longer accurate because OP has since change names, but thankfully, it’s still up with the original post from that day (March 26th, 2011) stil intact:

So, to recap, a fan asked Johannah if she’d seen the painting she’d made of the entire fucking band and Johannah politely replied that the band would hang it up in their shared flat. A flat that they were never planning on getting all together.

Do you understand how Larrie fantasy is constructed?

Somehow that got twisted into some kind of domestic bliss AU where Anne is a doting mother-in-law storing her son’s boyfriend’s belongings while they flat hunt together. Ridiculous. Fucking. Nonsense.

Moving on. We haven’t reached this part of the timeline yet, but since it’s just around the corner, I’m going to take this little aside to address these two tweets, because (shocker) they were also wildly misinterpreted. Tweet 1 / Tweet 2

The assumption made here is that Johannah was referencing house-hunting—first with Harry and Louis, and then the next day with Anne and Gemma—which Larries interpret as a whole family affair of flat-hunting for Harry and Louis in London. Cue the “they were going to move in together” theories.

Now, I’ll admit, this one is slightly less deranged than the painting theory. At least the word “real estate” is involved. But it’s still very much a reach. And, as usual, it leans heavily on fanfic logic: no context, wild speculation, and total disregard for actual reality. If filling in the blanks with fanfiction were a paid job, Larries would be millionnaires.

What everyone conveniently ignores is this reply from Gemma (Harry’s sister) to Johannah’s second tweet:

Now, let’s look at what’s actually going on here.

Johannah’s second tweet included the hashtag #totallyexactlysweetie.

Gemma responded with “Well exactly dahhhling”, adding that exaggerated “dahhhling” spelling that screams tongue-in-cheek.

Put all of that together—the repetition, the spelling, the absurdly posh phrasing—and it’s very clearly some kind of inside joke. Maybe they were mocking a movie character, maybe someone they overheard, or just being silly. Who knows?

It’s the kind of thing people do when they’re cracking up over a ridiculous accent or quote that somehow became a group bit. And that makes far more sense than assuming they were all out together looking for apartments for their teenage sons.

Also, let’s not forget:

There’s nothing else—not on social media, not in interviews, not in photos—that backs up the idea of them looking for apartments.

At the time (April 2011), the guys were still living in hotels. And would continue to do so for several months to come.

When they did eventually move somewhere more permanent, the apartment was provided by the label, not rented by them.

The label had an agreement with a real estate developer to host their talent in a specific property. They’d done it with other acts in the past (specifically with JLS between 2009 and 2010). The 1D guys were most likely fully aware of this fact.

They hadn’t released a second of music yet. No singles, no album, no music videos. In other words: no guaranteed income.

Now—could they have been apartment-hunting? Technically, I suppose it’s not impossible. But these tweets are absolutely not enough reason to believe so, given context, when they could mean so many other things.

Why on earth would two teens—barely out of reality TV—be making long-term housing decisions in London, one of the most expensive cities in the world, without any assurance of financial stability? Especially when housing was already provided by the label? Let’s say the two teens were stupid and inexperienced and making rash decisions... why would their moms go along with it?

Short answer: They wouldn’t.

The OG Larrie I mentioned earlier was Bulletprooflarry. She began creating so-called “timelines” to “prove” Larry was real sometime in late 2012 or early 2013, right around when she launched her blog. And she kept up this harmful behavior until around 2018 or 2019, when she finally abandoned the blog.

A lot of the nonsense still repeated in the Larrie fandom today originates with her. She’s the source of so much of the Larry lore—some of it absurd, some of it straight-up fabricated, and all of it drenched in delusion.

She started twisting these tweets in particular in January 2013, when she created her “April 2011 timeline” (which has over 1,200 notes) and continued to periodically lie about them for years. This post in particular is from 2018...

Let’s count the lies in that short little paragraph:

“Louis was keeping his things at Harry's house” Nope. We’ve already been over this. The “it” in that tweet was a fan painting. Not Louis’ things. Nothing was being stored.

“Which indicated that Harry and Louis were planning to move together by that point” Literally no such indication. You have to twist the tweet into a pretzel and read it with Larrie goggles on to arrive at that conclusion. There’s no evidence for this. Zero.

“After that they lived in a London hotel for about 2-3 weeks total.” This one’s gonna be debunked shortly. Spoiler alert: they lived in those hotels a hell of a lot longer than 2–3 weeks.

“Then they look for apartments” All of this based on an out of context joke, mind you. Again, they didn’t go apartment hunting, and when they finally did live somewhere more permanent, the label arranged it. It was never about them choosing or renting a flat themselves.

She also tries to use the VEVO LIFT video (which we’ve already gone over) as “proof,” conveniently ignoring the actual context and source of that video. Once again: dishonest framing, selective quoting, and fantasy sold as fact.

This is exactly why you cannot take anything a Larrie says at face value. Bulletprooflarry branded herself as this “expert researcher” who was just presenting the facts. But when you take a closer look, her “facts” are riddled with baseless assumptions, deliberate distortions, and outright lies.

Anyway—back to the timeline of events.

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April 10th - April 18th, 2011

After The X Factor Tour ended, the guys had a few days off. First, they each went back to their hometowns from the 10th to the 12th. Then, from the 13th to the 19th, they went on a short vacation. They, as in Louis, Harry, and their respective best friends Stanley Lucas and Jonathan Harvey (Jonny from Harry's Love of My Life).

The four of them went on a ski trip to France.

Now, of course, the Larries turned this into some kind of secret romantic getaway, despite the very obvious, very platonic vibe of the entire trip. Because apparently, in their world, bringing your two straight best friends on your first big romantic holiday with your secret boyfriend (while you’re both still teenagers) makes perfect sense...

While they were there, Louis posted a video to his old YouTube channel on April 15th—the same channel he had before joining 1D, where he used to post song covers. Harry is the one filming. Louis is sitting to his left, Jonny to his right. The guy dancing is Stan.

Some Larries paused the video when it pans to Jonny and swear that the purple thing next to him on the couch is a dildo. It’s most likely just a Wii controller. You know, like the ones people use to play video games. But I guess when you’re desperately trying to turn a lads’ holiday into a sexy secret couple’s retreat, anything vaguely cylindrical becomes “evidence.”

Imagine being this far gone: believing that two teenage boys were not only in a committed very adult relationship, but went on a romantic trip together with their straight best friends, and casually left their sex toys out on the couch for all to see. Do they even hear themselves?

Harry and Louis were clearly close friends. Nobody is denying that. But there’s nothing romantic about this trip. It looks like what it was: a group of teenage lads on holiday, being silly and having fun. The romantic undertones are 100% fabricated by Larries, who are constantly trying to inject meaning into moments that are completely mundane.

April 19th - April 22nd, 2011

After their ski trip, they were back in London during this period. They were spotted at studios, which tracks perfectly with the fact that they’d started working on music around this time.

This is also when Johannah posted the tweets I previously addressed. So, we know their families were visiting London at this time too.

April 23rd - April 28th, 2011

They had a few days off, and they each went back to their respective hometowns. On April 25th, Harry was spotted in Holmes Chapel. Meanwhile, Louis spent Easter weekend with his girlfriend, Hannah Walker. On April 24th, her sister tweeted a picture of the two of them together.

After that, Louis went on another trip with his best friend Stan this time to Jersey. Not a single Larrie called this one romantic though. Curious!

April 29th - May 11th, 2011

They were consistently spotted at various London hotels and recording studios during this time. And by consistently, I mean fans were clocking them daily. Why so many hotels? Because fans had developed a knack for crowding lobbies, so they had to bounce around—a new hotel every few days just to avoid chaos.

Likely, the very first sessions happened back in January, when they took a short trip to LA. And again, in mid-April, when they were seen heading into studios around London. But this period—late April and onwards—is when things really kicked off in earnest.

The album they were working on, Up All Night, was primarily recorded in London and Stockholm, because Swedish producers basically run pop music (think of the likes of Max Martin, Shellback, Rami Yacoub).

May 12th - May 21st, 2011

The guys travelled to Sweden for the first time. Harry later mentioned how wild it was to be recognized there.

In case you’re wondering how I know the exact dates, I’m referencing two Larrie blogs that tagged everything by date—but I’m fact-checking as I go, cross-referencing social media posts, interviews, and other reliable sources.

This part of the timeline is especially important because it highlights just how ridiculous the whole “they lived together” narrative is. When I walk you through how little time they actually spent living together—plus, what they were doing during that time, and what the broader context was—you’ll see how insignificant that brief living arrangement really was. Once we get to the end, you’ll understand the perspective a lot better.

May 22nd - May 25th, 2011

They had a few days off and each went back home to visit their families. Louis. Harry.

May 26th - June 3rd, 2011

They’re back in London for, like, a day—just enough time to attend the premiere of JLS’ movie. Then they head to Brighton for a couple of days. No clue what for, but definitely work related. Brighton’s a coastal town in the south of England.

After that, they return to London again, and once more, they’re spotted staying at hotels. Remember how Bulletproof claimed they were only in hotels for a couple of weeks and had already moved into “their flat” by late April or early May?

Yeah… that was a fucking lie.

June 4th + 5th, 2011

Another quick trip back home. Harry (bonus: you can see his old terraced house in the background). Louis.

June 6th - June 10th, 2011

Back to Sweden to continue recording the album. Fun fact: Zayn started singing What Makes You Beautiful in front of fans months before it officially came out.

June 11th - June 25th, 2011

Back to LA for more recording.

June 26th - July 4th, 2011

They arrive in London, but immediately go to their hometowns for a few days. Harry. Louis.

July 5th - July 29th, 2011

I’m grouping this entire stretch together because they were clearly still in album mode. They were back in London and, once again, staying in hotels. They remained in London until the 7th, then flew to LA until the 14th. During this trip, they filmed the What Makes You Beautiful music video in Malibu.

They got back to London on the 15th. Louis popped back to Doncaster for a day, while Harry seemed to stay in London. This is also when Louis apparently broke up with Hannah.

On July 16th, with Louis back in London, they did an interview with Teen Now and immediately flew off to Sweden. At the airport, Harry and Louis were gifted “His and Her” towels, and of course, the fact that they didn’t reject the gifts has been endlessly spun by Larries as #LarryProof.

They stayed in Sweden until the 20th, then returned to London and—shocker—back to hotels.

We’re now at the end of July and still no sign of that mythical shared flat Bulletproof swore they’d moved into back in early May. Curious how she missed this, considering she did such thorough timelines and was such an authority. We’re off by over two months already—and trust me, it’s only going to get worse.

July 30th - August 1st, 2011

Louis was newly single after over a year of dating Hannah. As mentioned in the post I linked above, he already seemed to be getting involved with Eleanor—whom he’d met back in March during the X Factor Tour stop in Manchester—but I doubt it was anything serious right off the bat.

Harry went back home to Holmes Chapel. Louis, meanwhile, did what any freshly single 19-year-old guy would do: he went to Ibiza with his mates (you can spot Stan to his right). The fact that Larries are so blinded by the idea that he was partying with male friends (like 99.99% of straight men tend to do?) that they completely miss the painfully obvious cliché—breaking up with your long-term girlfriend and heading to a party island with the lads—is honestly hilarious.

August 2nd - August 15th, 2011

Back in London. On August 2nd, they did an interview with Chart Show. They were still being spotted at hotels (just dropping a few pics here: August 3rd, August 8th, August 10th), much to Bulletproof’s dismay.

Louis—still very much newly single—went on another party trip, this time to Magaluf. In fact, he tweeted Harry in the most bro way possible while he was there.

Aww, so romantic!

Fun fact: Harry didn’t even reply. He, instead, tweeted at his new bestie Nick Grimshaw five minutes later. You’ll never see Larries address how ridiculous all of this would be if he and Louis were so in loooooove.

They did an interview with The Mirror on August 9th.

Larries—particularly Bulletproof—take this interview (where they’re asked whether they’re looking into moving to London) and combine it with Johannah’s tweets to claim they were apartment hunting. No.

They don’t mention apartment hunting in the interview. The interviewer simply asks if they’ve looked at houses. It’s very likely that, at this point, they’d already been told by the label where they were going to live (you’ll soon see why), and that’s what they meant. Johannah’s tweets—which were almost certainly unrelated to any apartment search—were from three months prior to this interview, and since then, there has been literally ZERO indication of any of them doing any sort of apartment or house hunting.

Bulletproof ignores the fact that she's been proven wrong about all her other timing theories, of course. Her post, the one I linked, has 6,000+ notes. That's how far and wide disinformation travels in Larrie-land.

On this same day, we also get the whole #Olive thing (Harry, Ed Sheeran, and Louis all tweet about olives). Larries take the fact that all three tweeted the same thing to mean that Harry and Louis were living together and Ed came over to visit them. Nope. Louis came over to visit Harry and Ed. But I’ll get to that in a second.

Meanwhile, throughout all of this, they were still in London—recording the album, doing bits of promo, and even shooting an ad for Nokia on August 15th.

August 16th - August 23rd, 2011

They did a mini radio tour around the UK and Ireland to promote their upcoming single What Makes You Beautiful on multiple stations. I’m not going to link all of that because it’s messy and, more importantly, they were obviously not living together in London—which, again, is what we’re addressing right now. Harry met Lucy Horobin during this promo tour, which I already went over on this other post.

The video for this song came out on August 19th, but the single itself didn’t drop until September. This will soon become relevant.

August 24th - September 24th, 2011

During this month, they came and went, but were mostly in London. I’m not going to post more hotel sighting pics and tweets—it’s tedious to find, and it’s no longer relevant. You’ll see why in just a second. But yes, they were still staying at hotels.

Harry and Louis (along with friends) went to Leeds Festival for two days (August 27th/28th).

They then did a bunch of promo for their single, which came out on September 11th and went #1 in the UK.

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THIRD ASIDE: The Shape of Delusion

One thing Larries either fully ignore or brush off as irrelevant is the fact that, while 1D was staying at hotels during this very long period of several months (as opposed to the 2–3 weeks Bulletproof insisted on), Harry… well, he often wouldn’t stay in these hotels.

I’m not saying he never did—there are pictures of him with fans outside the hotels too—but he frequently chose not to stay in them when they were in London.

We don’t know why. Maybe he didn’t like the hotels. Maybe he didn’t like that so many fans waited outside. He never explained it, so we’d only be guessing.

Instead of staying at the hotels, a lot of the time he would choose to stay with friends instead. Apparently, there were a bunch of them (rumor has it he stayed a lot with Lou Teasdale and her boyfriend, Tom Atkin, though I don’t have concrete sources for that). However, we do know of one for sure—because the friend talked about it: Chris Leonard.

Chris Leonard is a guitarist and songwriter. He first met 1D while working with them on The X Factor. He continued working with them as they started recording their debut album, and he even wrote songs with Harry later on (ones we sadly never got to hear).

Chris Leonard co-wrote Lego House with Ed Sheeran (one of Ed’s first hits). Ed was “homeless” in 2011. His family was from Suffolk, a town a couple of hours from London, so while he was working on his music—before he made it big—he often stayed at Chris Leonard’s house.

That’s how Harry and Ed met…

This is something Ed himself confirmed. In an interview he did with Popstar!, he said:

Can you tell us about your friendship with 1D?

“I just started hanging out with Harry from—I lived on my friend’s Chris’s sofa and Chris played guitar for those boys. And I lived on that sofa [gestures horizontally] and there was another sofa there [gestures in front of the previous spot], so sometimes I’d wake up in the morning and there’d be this, kind of floppy-haired dude on the sofa opposite.

And I knew it was Harry—I didn't watch The X Factor, so I didn’t know what One Direction was. This was way before they’d had any kind of singles out or anything.

And, you know, we started hanging out, and Chris was like, ‘Oh, he’s in a boyband.’ And I was like, ‘Oh, that's cool man. That’s fun.’ Then I met Louis and started hanging out with him as well.

And then they said, ‘We’re looking for songs for our album. Can you give us any songs?’ And I gave them a demo CD of songs that I was pitching at that time, and they chose Moments off it, and then two songs on the new album [1D’s second album] from that same demo CD.

So, yeah, it just came through that. But it’s a lot more of a friendship than it is a working relationship, even though I give them songs from time to time. They are really nice guys, and I like hanging out with them.”

(He continues talking about Harry bringing a melon to the studio, but I figured this was enough for now. 😂)

Of course, Larries take the fact that Ed singles out Louis as some sort of #LarryProof. When all it means is that Harry brought who we know was his close friend to meet his new mates. Harry and Louis were besties at that time. ONCE AGAIN, NOBODY DENIES THIS.

Anyway, Harry and Ed became close friends thanks to that connection. Ed confirmed it again in a podcast interview in May 2023:

“There was a guitarist that knew both of us called Chris [Leonard], that I wrote Lego House with. He used to play for the One Direction lads, and me and Harry used to sleep at his house together.”

Now, why is this so relevant?

Well, because… if Harry was itching to move in with his boyfriend—who he was supposedly so in love with—then why, when he had the opportunity to stay at a hotel with him, did he choose to crash at some random dude’s house? On his couch, of all places?

And Larries (spearheaded by Bulletproof) can try to claim that “it was only for like a day or two” all they want, but that doesn’t make it true.

We have that tweet from Harry’s in March 2011, meaning this goes as far back as then. (1D was still on the X Factor tour, but the tweet came right after a show in London, so the timeline tracks perfectly.) And we also know for a fact that Harry was still staying at Chris’s house by mid-September!

Chris himself said so!

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Chris Leonard (@mrchrisleonardpics)

Caption:

Another little story for you. This pair of hobos didn’t seem to have homes of their own at the time so mine became a youth hostel for pop stars. We’d been out for drinks at the Durrell the night before and Ed and Harry crashed over at my place. What Makes You Beautiful was number 1 in the singles chart and + was number 1 in the album chart so we used this to decide who slept where. It was deemed that albums were more important than singles so Ed got the sofa and Harry slept on the floor. This photo I took is of Ed testing out the orgasmatron head massager I’d just bought off eBay on Harry

Both What Makes You Beautiful (1D’s debut single) and Ed Sheeran’s + (his debut album) went to #1 in the UK the same week. So they sorted out who got to sleep on the couch and who had to sleep on the floor—based on which achievement was more impressive.

They decided an album trumped a single. So Ed got the couch, and Harry slept on the floor.

(I presume that by this point—between March and September—Chris had gotten rid of that second sofa he once had. Rude.)

That means Harry was still crashing at Chris Leonard’s house and had not moved into his apartment when WMYB and + went #1. The week this happened was September 23rd, 2011 (the chart gets published on Fridays).

Singles chart. Albums chart.

Remember the pic Chris posted alongside his anecdote? Of Ed using the “orgasmatron” on Harry? Well, he originally tweeted that same pic on September 19th—four days before the charts would’ve been publicly known. So they were already staying at his place days before that little floor-vs-couch game. That means Harry was spending multiple days a week at Chris’ place, not just popping by.

Obviously, Chris wasn’t tweeting about it every time Harry or Ed stayed over, but here you have a small sample of a few of the times he did: (Jul 6th / Aug 5th - Aug 6th)

On August 9th, 2011, when all three—Harry, Ed, and Louis—tweeted “#olive,” despite Larries fighting hard to make that this weird Larrie “moment,” where some insist Louis and Harry lived in their magical love nest, and were being visited by Ed, the reality was that Harry was staying with Ed at Chris’s house, and Louis just came over. That’s it. That’s the real, grounded, non-fanfictional version of events.

Before we continue with the timeline, let’s recap:

Harry and Louis didn’t plan on moving in together during The X Factor because they were so in love. Most likely, it was a backup plan in case the show didn’t work out and they didn’t make it in the industry.

Anne did not store Louis’ things “until they moved in together.”

They weren’t actively planning to move in together in the spring.

They didn’t go apartment hunting in the spring.

They didn’t move in together in April or May.

For the majority of that time, they were on the move—constantly. And when they were in London, they stayed in hotels.

And, crucially, Harry would often stay with friends while they were in London—not at those hotels. He did this consistently for about six months.

This paints a completely different picture from the Larrie fantasy timeline.

Not one of star-crossed lovers who moved in together secretly in the spring, but of two teenage bandmates navigating sudden fame—living in hotels, crashing on friends’ couches, figuring out their lives, not building a domestic love nest in the suburbs.

Let’s keep going.

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September 25th - September 29th, 2011

One Direction flew to New York through Montreat to film the music video for their second single, Gotta Be You.

Wikipedia claims the video was filmed in October in Lake Placid—but that’s... incorrect. 1D didn’t go to New York in October. They did go in late September. They arrived on the 25th and flew back on the 29th.

Fun fact? This video shoot would be the moment where Harry met Emma Ostilly.

September 30th - October 5th, 2011

One Direction went on a short promotional tour across Europe. During this time, they visited Sweden, Italy, Germany, and the Netherlands.

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FOURTH ASIDE: We’ve come so far from Princess Park

So, we’ve arrived. We made it to Princess Park. Let’s talk about it and put it in perspective.

What was Princess Park?

Princess Park Manor used to be an asylum called Friern Hospital until it closed in 1993. It was sold in 1995 to Irish property developers Luke and Brian Comer. The Comer brothers had (probably had, at this point—considering The X Factor has been canceled and Syco Records doesn’t exist anymore) a long-term agreement with Syco Entertainment to house their artists. They also had agreements with other record labels and football clubs, and housed a lot of major UK celebs, such as Cheryl Cole and footballer Ashley Cole (this is allegedly where they met).

Kimberley Walsh, a member of Girls Aloud alongside Cheryl, said this about it:

“There’s a crew of people that kind of just know each other a bit, because we just used to cross paths so much. We all used to live in the same place as well. We all used to live in this mental hospital. All of us, like all these pop bands at the same time. McFly were there for a bit. We lived there… The Sugababes, JLS for a bit. It was a fun time in a way, because if you all got back on the side of Saturday night and everyone was still ready carrying on, then just pick someone’s flat and carry on there. I went to a party at McFly’s once. I can’t remember what it was in aid of!”

JLS were signed to Syco—they competed on The X Factor in 2008 and came in second.

Did Harry and Louis rent an apartment there?

No. Syco gave all of the 1D members apartments in this complex under their agreement with the property developers.

All five members of One Direction moved into Princess Park Manor at the same time. Niall, Liam, and Zayn had separate apartments, while Harry and Louis shared one.

When did they move there?

Well, Harry had this exchange with Lou Teasdale, One Direction’s stylist on September 4th:

Harry is essentially apologizing to Lou for making her climb so many stairs while she was pregnant with her daughter Lux. Lou is telling him she won’t be able to come over until she’s given birth, and that even then she’ll struggle with the stroller, but that the place is really nice. This tells us that they had absolutely not moved before September 4th. Lou and her boyfriend lived in London and saw Harry almost every single day.

Furthermore, it’s unlikely they moved in by this time either, and he was most likely just showing her around the place where he would live soon.

For one, we know Harry was still actively staying with Chris Leonard pretty often at this point. But for two, Louis would give a statement to The Sun about them in this article that came out on September 13th, 2011:

Most 18-year-olds are still living with their parents or moving in to student digs, where finding a clean fork is considered a luxury, but as their debut single is released, the One Direction lads are set to settle in to swanky London flats. Simon Cowell has sorted the boys out with an apartment each in their own private block — except for youngest member Harry Styles and the group’s caner Louis Tomlinson, who will share. When they’re not all doing their hair, the band have a gym and cinema room for their personal use. Louis said: “Me and Harry are sharing a flat and the other boys have their own. At the moment they are a work in progress but the cinema room is a really cool place. “It’s on the top floor of the block. “We’re going to get all of our mates round to watch a film in it. “It’s amazing — not that I want to brag.”

“At the moment they are a work in progress” and “setting to settle” both suggest that they hadn’t moved in yet, but that the move was imminent. As I’ve said multiple times in previous posts, The Sun functioned as an unofficial mouthpiece for the band at the time—which is perfectly illustrated by the fact that Louis gave them a direct quote.

Since we know Harry was spending time at Chris Leonard’s during those weeks, and the band would be travelling for a couple of weeks afterward, we can reasonably infer that the moving process likely began in mid-to-late September. They probably fully moved in after the brief European promo tour I mentioned earlier in the timeline—around early October 2011.

Why did Harry and Louis share while the others didn’t?

We don’t have an official reason. Since Syco had an arrangement with the property developers, a reasonable guess is that only four apartments were available as part of that deal. Given that Harry and Louis were close and had previously talked about moving in together if things didn’t work out with The X Factor, it’s likely that when the label said two of them would need to share, they volunteered.

The fact that they were the youngest and oldest could’ve contributed to why the label would agree to this. Keep in mind that, by the time they moved—October 2011—Louis was 19 almost 20 (he’d turn 20 in December), Zayn was 18 almost 19 (he’d turn 19 in January), and Liam and Niall had recently turned 18 (in August and September respectively). Harry was still a few months away from turning 18.

Since his name wasn’t going to be on the lease, it most likely wasn’t a legal issue. Louis didn’t have to be Harry’s guardian—no matter how many times Larries repeat that. If Harry didn’t need a guardian to stay in hotels, then he certainly didn’t need one to live in a house that was leased on his behalf. And if, hypothetically, a guardian had been required, it would’ve been someone from the label or management—not another teenage member of the band. That’s just common sense.

Of course, this is all speculation. We don’t have concrete answers for any of this—mainly because, in an ideal world, these wouldn’t even be questions we’d have to ask. As I’ve said in other posts, I often feel like I’m forced to debunk the Larries’ wild imagination and fanfiction. And to do that, I end up having to lay out my own version of events—just… more grounded in reality, and supported by actual logic.

What Larries never seem to consider is this: they believe Syco was forcing the boys to stay in the closet and to publicly date women—Louis was first seen with Eleanor in mid-September, and Harry started openly flirting with Caroline around the same time.

But at the same time, they also believe that Syco allowed the “happy couple” (Harry and Louis) to live together—and not just in secret, but to advertise it on social media and talk about it in interviews.

I keep saying this, but you can’t have it both ways. Either the label were evil overlords who forced a 17-year-old to fake two relationships with women nearly twice his age to hide the fact he was queer and dating his bandmate… or they let that same 17-year-old live with that same bandmate and be public about it.

Pick one. Logic demands it.

Details about the apartment

The reason their apartment had so many stairs is because they were given the dome. I’m specifically referring to this part:

You can find some photos of the place here. Here’s one of the cinema room that Louis mentioned in the article I posted above:

Harry and Louis had a New Year’s Eve party at the apartment in 2011 and invited a bunch of their friends, as well as the other 1D guys and their live band. Because of that, we actually have several photos from inside the apartment.

You can see the wooden structures in the background here:

And the cinema room’s screen in the back here:

This is a picture of the kitchen in that apartment:

Picture of Harry in the kitchen:

This apartment was actually really inconvenient. There were two bedrooms on the first floor, both with ensuite bathrooms. Then on the second floor, two more bathrooms plus another bedroom. The kitchen was on the third floor, the living room on the fourth, and the cinema room on the fifth. No wonder Harry apologized to Lou for all the stairs.

(And just to be clear: none of this is secret or new info. We knew about all of it as it was happening. There were loads of articles at the time.)

I’m adding all these details to help contextualize the situation a bit more. Most Larries who are active now weren’t around back then, and they have no idea that it was a massive, multi-storey apartment inside a literal mansion, paid for by the label. Over time, the actual details have been warped or forgotten, and now a lot of them genuinely believe it was some cute little love nest Harry and Louis rented together because they were so in love.

Habit

Years later, during his solo career, Louis released a song called Habit, which includes these lyrics:

I took some time ’cause I’ve ran out of energy Of playing someone I heard I'm supposed to be But honestly, I don’t have to choose anymore And it’s been ages, different stages Come so far from Princess Park I’ll always need ya In front of me, in front of me

Of course, Larries took this and ran with it. BUT...

Remember when I mentioned a couple of times how Louis cheated on Hannah and said I would go over that in more detail later? Well, here we are. This is my in-depth post about it, in case you want to read it, as I’ll only touch on the subject here.

Louis started dating Hannah in March 2010, before he even auditioned for the show. They dated throughout his time on The X Factor and during the first few months with the band. Hannah would often post pictures with Louis. She visited him when they were on tour with the other finalists and when he was recording in London.

Still, as I mentioned before and in the post I linked, Louis met a girl named Eleanor in March 2011. He broke up with Hannah in July, and a couple of days later, he started openly interacting with Eleanor’s cousin. We don’t know the details of his and Eleanor’s relationship, but logic tells us that they were in touch between March and July, that they likely cheated to some degree, and that after July, they pursued some sort of relationship. They made that relationship official on November 17th, since a year later, that would be the date of their anniversary.

As I said before in this post, right after breaking things off with Hannah, Louis had a few cliché newly-single weeks in August, where he flew first to Ibiza and a few weeks later to Magaluf. Both of those are party destinations, and he went there with a bunch of friends. Notably, not Harry.

He started to be seen with Eleanor in mid-September, around the time that Princess Park was being set up for them to live. In fact, he was first seen with Eleanor on September 15th. Remember, the article with Louis’ quote about Princess Park came out on September 13th...

Princess Park represented the inception of One Direction’s career. They, all of the band, were in that apartment when they released their debut album (November 2011) and when they started their first headlining tour (December 2011). They were also there when Louis’ relationship with Eleanor turned serious.

As I have proven in this post, Larries twisted everything around Harry and Louis’ living situation to sound romantic when it wasn’t. They changed dates, ignored context, outright lied about what happened and when at times.

For instance, here is Harry tweeting a photo of Louis and Eleanor watching X Factor at their apartment (Eleanor literally trying to hide):

Louis is not responsible for Larries changing facts about his own life and experiences. Larries will tell you, “He knows what Princess Park means for us.” And I’ll reply this...

He probably has some idea, for sure. He has shown that he’s aware of (and annoyed by) some Larry theories in the past, but he is absolutely not reading your Tumblr essays. Be fucking for real.

Because he’s aware of how insane you are, he’s also probably aware of the fact that you guys twist everything. His clothes, his favorite number, his tattoos, his lyrics, his every word, his every facial expression. How is he supposed to avoid triggering Larries?

Further, why should he censor his own lived experiences when expressing himself in his art? Just because you, a stranger, unilaterally decided to make insane theories about them?

How is that fucking fair and not a ridiculous expectation?

-----

With this, we end this section of the post, since it’s already so long. In the next one, we’ll go over when they actually did move into the same apartment, how long they lived there, and what happened after.

You can find that post here. Part III here.

[sophaeros]

arctic monkeys for rip it up - new zealand, june/july 2007 / no. 317

Monkey Storm

It's been just over a year since Rip It Up spoke to indie superstars Arctic Monkeys. Since then they've toured the world, played a stonking show in Auckland, and just released their second album Favourite Worst Nightmare, so we figured it was time to talk to them again. Guitarist Jamie Cook took Rip It Up's call.

by Helene Ravlich

You can't get much farther from the UK town of Sheffield than the middle of the Palm Desert, which Arctic Monkeys guitarist Jamie Cook describes as "steaming, it were really hot," while chowing down on a Mexican meal in midtown Los Angeles.

He describes the band's experience of playing the Coachella music festival in said area as being "just lovely”, choosing to ignore the events of only two days before. On Friday, the youthful quartet played their indie hit ‘I Bet You Look Good On the Dance Floor;, but failed to impress former Faith No More singer Mike Patton, who was also performing with his really rather amazing trip-hop-influenced project, Peeping Tom. Resplendent in a doo-rag and a faux bulletproof vest, he led his crowd on an adjacent stage into mocking laughter directed at the English band. It appears that the Arctics - who recently released their second album, Favourite Worst Nightmare - were largely oblivious to the ex-Faith No More frontman's shenanigans, and just carried on having a bloody good time.

For those of you who may have been hiding under the duvet for the last few years, the Arctic Monkeys were one of the music world's most recent meteoric success stories. Just a bunch of likely lads from High Green (a suburb of Sheffield) much in need of a course of ProActiv acne wash, the Arctics achieved their success largely through fan-made demo tapes and online file-sharing. They were heralded as one of the first acts to come to the public attention via the internet (pre-MySpace), with commentators suggesting they represented the possibility of a change in the way in which new bands are promoted and marketed. The band eventually signed to independent record label Domino and their debut album, Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not, became the fastest-selling debut album in British music history and received unbridled displays of critical acclaim, including winning the 2006 Mercury Prize.

Since the release of that first album it's been pretty manic for the lads, who are still barely out of their teens. Surely by now they must be in need of some time off?

"Well we didn't really want to take any," says Cook, "I guess you could call it time off when we were recording but even that didn't take that long at all because we all get quite bored quite easily”.

That teenage leaning towards ADHD even infiltrates any attempt at a holiday with once again the guitarist saying that "we don't really take holidays because they just make us get even more bored”. Did some of that urgency stem from the jitters due to having the pressure to produce a second album as successful as their first weighing on their shoulders?

"No not all all, definitely not. We all really love touring and recording and going non-stop - that's what you start a band for, you know what I mean? We just wanted to get back into the studio so we could get that out of the way and go back on tour... we'd been on the road for 18 months but just wanted to get back out there."

So the band write when they are out on the road?

"Yeah a few songs were wrote on the road and a few were wrote in the studio," explains the guitarist, "and when we had a few days at home in Sheffield a few were wrote there too."

He says that the songs are also written using a variety of methods, including those that are generated from a general band jam session which singer Alex then goes away and creates lyrics for.

"Sometimes a song will come from a drum part or someone having a play on the acoustic guitar," he explains, "and we just develop it together."

Despite the fact that they have pretty much only seen the inside of tour buses and hotel rooms for the past couple of years he says that they still find inspiration from things observed on the road, as well as seemingly insignificant events that remain in their minds. New track 'The Only Ones Who Know' dates back to an innocuous story of two newcomers to the city who asked the band one Sunday night, "where's good to go tonight?" Vocalist and lyricist Turner later turned this into the aforementioned romantic wee song, which hopes that the pair are "still holding hands by New Year's Eve".

Formed in 2002, the band currently consists of Alex Turner on lead vocals and guitar, Cook on guitar, Matt Helders on drums and backing vocals and Nick O'Malley on bass guitar, a position formerly held by Andy Nicholson. Nicholson suddenly upped and left the group after pulling out of a North American tour last year, and the band issued the following, rather bland statement: "We are sad to tell everyone that Andy is no longer with the band. We have been mates with Andy for a long time and have been through some amazing things together that no one can take away. We all wish Andy the very best". The bass player's initial departure from the US tour was blamed on "fatigue following an intensive period of touring," and then he finally threw the remainder of his toys out of the cot and left for good.

Maybe one day we'll all just go mad... There you go — end of this year we'll all be in rehab! Jamie Cook

So Andy was out and the band gained Nick, both of whom have been friends with the others in the band since childhood. Do they ever see Andy around during the rare trips they get to take back to Sheffield?

"Yeah we do," says Cook, "he's a DJ now and does a club night on a Saturday there that we like to go to when we can."

He adds that the ex-bass player is also trying to get a band back together so he obviously has got over the trauma of his earlier experience with the Arctics. He says that O'Malley's entrance into the band was almost seamless, and that after he filled in for Nicholson after he dropped off early in their US tour it immediately felt "natural" and so he stayed. Surely the current line up feels at times the enormous pressure of being The Next Big Thing, and now a million pretenders have been signed in their wake and are probably enduring much of the same. How does the still really rather young guitarist recommend that they cope? How do his band stay sane in the face of media madness and public fanaticism?

"I don't rightly know," he says with a laugh, "maybe one day we'll all just go mad... There you go - end of this year we'll all be in rehab!

“That seems to be the thing to do right now, doesn't it?" he continues, "start feeling sorry for yourself and then just ship off to a clinic".

Drummer Matt Helders has reportedly taken up boxing in order to stay in shape for the rigours of their relentless touring schedule, but one can hardly imagine the scrawnier members of the band attempting the same.

As well as a new bass player, Favourite Worst Nightmare also sees the arrival of two new producers for the band. After making Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not with acclaimed rock producer Jim Abiss (Kasabian, DJ Shadow, Placebo), the band took a creative swerve on its follow up by working with James Ford (whose "We Are Your Friends' — as Simian — became a UK club smash in tandem with the Arctics) and Mike Crossey. Vocalist Turner has said that, "from the very first session we did it was obvious that it was sound with them", and Cook agrees, adding that the producers are barely older than the band themselves and understood them from the get go. They had actually started work on their debut with Ford and Crossey but Abiss was called in to take over not long after, so when it was time to start work on album number two they knew that they had more control and could choose to go back to their original choice of producers. He echoes Turner saying, “we just knew right from the start that we'd done the right thing and still feel good about doing it". What did they bring to the sound of the album and the process that Abiss couldn't offer?

"I can't really put my finger on it," he says, "it was just a load of new ideas and a matter of working with people who really understood what we were trying to do.

"We haven't really done much time in the studio but they were really willing to explain things to us," he adds, which is one of the best ways of learning, innit?"

He says the process was very democratic though, with everyone's individual ideas given airtime and considered, whether or not the production duo agreed with them, "but if something was really shit they'd kind of tell us, and we respected that".

He says that the time spent on a seemingly never-ending tour has at least given him the chance to check out new music, and he likes a lot of what he hears.

"I really love the new Arcade Fire album," he enthuses, "and they were at Coachella too so I got to actually watch them, which was amazing".

He's also a big fan of the Kings of Leon and relative newbies the Klaxons, but says that he can hear the funeral bells tolling for the UK indie scene which singled out his band to be huge.

"There's just so many shit bands back home now that I think anyone with a guitar can get signed, he says, "especially if they've got a nice haircut or something".

He's excited about touring the United States however, which they had previously only visited for a whirlwind three and a half weeks. Are they actively looking to properly break into that massive market? "I don't really know, we think people like us over here but who knows?" he explains, "we haven't been bottled yet.."

This year the lads have been given the mammoth task of being the headlining act at Glastonbury. which is surely no mean feat for a band barely out of their teens. Cook says that the whole band were hugely flattered at being asked, and explains that part of that was due to the fact that the ink was well dry on the contract before they had even started work on their second album.

"We just feel so honoured and can't wait," he says with true excitement in his voice, "I've never even been to Glastonbury because I've always been too young or couldn't get a ticket. I'd watch it every year on the telly and just think how much I'd like to go, and now, I'm bloody playing it!"

[pandaroboto]

Taskmaster Recording Report

This will be a long post and it has spoilers, so proceed with caution. More after the cut.

I will put in two different sections, what happened on warm-up and between takes and what they cut from the episode and I remember. WARM UP

Greg told people to stop sending sexy DMs because he would disappoint all the ladies/some guys.

He introduced Alex who came to the stage and hugged Greg's...knees?

Greg told the audience Alex was a master and could mimic any animal doing a dance style. He did a guinea pig first and it was the cutest thing, then a wolf (there is a picture of this that was used on a press release) and then a lion. When Greg asked about a dance style I yelled SAMBA with all my strength and then I saw Alex trying to samba as a lion. It was amazing.

Mark Olver asked who came from furthest to watch it and I raised my hand and said Brazil and he said BULLSHIT, you didn't come here just for that. I then explained I also was going to see Tim Key in Cardiff the next day and he was like "Oh..she did came here just for that then"

Again British people can't understand my name so I was referred as "Brazil" for the rest of the afternoon

I was also questioned about how do I watch the show and I quickly replied Youtube .

He made me list my favorite contestants to see if I could stay in the country. I tried to think which contestants were on the YouTube series uploaded. I then said Bob Mortimer, Mike Wozniak and Mark Watson (Alex smiled a bit when I said his name). Olver went " I can't believe someone in Brazil was watching the Woz fart a pile"

When I was telling I am from Brazil Alex waved at me and I was sure he knew who I was because long story short a bunch of friends really made me feel special and got me a signed book by Alex and he knew I was going to be there after travelling for 14+ hours.

At that point Greg said "Did you come for me???" and I pathetically went YES Y ES YES. He waved at me and IDK till today how I survived this.

They joked about a guy being first row and not being a fan,Mark asked who he had to fuck to get those seat and greg was pointing to himself.

They said we were clapping at the wrong places and that would confuse Alex and Greg

After the recording when I got back to London randomly meet Asim Chaudhry on Leceister Square. He was so sweet. We chatted a bit , I talked about how Sandman was big here, and that he had Brazilian fans and he got very excited and telling his mates about it

STUDIO

Sue got a massive round of applause. I think she and Julian got the big whoops from the crowd

The prize task was so much longer. Lucy went for ages talking about the ghost of the dog, and Greg kept asking questions. I knew most of it would be cut, but Greg kept mentioning during the episode and made me question how they would edit the references. They are bloody genius those editors.

Sam's Pinocchio made quite the impression, and Greg had a lot of fun with it. They talk about Pinocchio's penis, there was questions if it grew too with the lies. And Greg kept saying Pinocchio during the recording.

Sue's monkey orgy story was longer too.

When they showed Sam getting super closer to Alex, Greg mentioned Alex was very uncomfortable with touch and to prove that he got really touchy. BTW guys the amount of hand touches, and whispers behind the cards...they are insane

After the team task they were basically talking about how kinky it was, and Greg joked about Alex tied up , hogtie style and that he enjoyed. This was the thing I was most excited and I hope they put on the outtakes because I know how the fandom will be mental about it.

Greg is...MAGNETIC! Like the man demands attention and is very hard to not be looking at him. I kept looking at them at the studio and mostly ignored the tasks because I knew that I could see them later.

The live task took ages to set up and to reset after every round, Greg even joked we would spend the night there. It was more or less 3 hours of taping.

Greg interacted with us a lot because they had to reset the seesaw all the time, At one point he asked us to go "oooooh" that was show in the episode but he asked Alex using those words "Do you want the audience to oooh you while you pull it out slowly for me?" and he said with such a voice that...if I were a dude I would have a boner.

There was a point when Alex had to explain the outcome and he got it wrong and the audience corrected him to Greg's delight, he was very giggly. Sue got quite mad at Alex and the chains.

I guess it was this. At least that is what I took from my notes.

[someinstant]

So I turned my ankle taking out my trash this evening and it's swelling up beautifully-- I did a number on that ankle back in college and it regularly betrays me because of the Dumb Things I did without seeking medical attention when I was twenty-- so I've decided to prop it up on the couch and ice the hell out of it and watch the special features on my ANDOR Blu-Ray.

Here's a short list of Cool Things I've learned:

Diego says that it was important to show Cassian being nice to B2EMO in the first bit of episode one, because you needed to see Cassian show care and kindness for someone-- because he's not a particularly awesome guy at the beginning.

The set designer for the Andor house on Ferix made macrame door curtains out of metal scrap and bolts because they wanted a 1970s feel with an industrial twist. Also, the set designer pronounces "macrame" with the accent on the second syllable, and I've never heard it that way before? British folks, is that standard on your fair isle? Because hereabouts it's MAC-rah-may, or maybe mac-rah-MAY if you're fancy. But it sure as hell isn't mah-CRAHM-eh.

Just so many gorgeous shots of Ferix, man. And all the costumes and details-- it looks SO GOOD, even when it's clearly just a set and not the finished version. The actors all clearly adored working in the physical space.

During the Aldhani arc, the Aldhani rebel cell actors worked extensively together with the director to train, rehearse, and develop chemistry-- and they deliberately didn't bring Diego Luna in until they were ready to shoot for real. So the Aldhani squad had this rapport and inside jokes and relationships, and THEN they dropped Luna in so he would feel properly like an outsider.

And they did the SAME THING on the Narkina 5 arc. All the prisoners rehearsed together well before they brought in Luna, so he wouldn't have the same understanding of the space or tools or way the actors related to each other. Love it. Really smart decision, and it paid off.

The visual reference for what the Eye would look like when you were flying through it was a close-up of a human iris, and actually-- yeah. They did that really, really well.

They made the prison on Narkina 5 the same shape as the planetary shield generator on Scarif, and I have no idea how I didn't notice that before.

Stellan Skarsgard was clearly DELIGHTED by Luthen's big speech in "Nobody's Listening." He talks about how when he read it, he was like, "Absolutely, this is the dilemma, isn't it? How far can you go in the name of change?," followed immediately by, "Now, how in the world do I SAY that?!"

The musicians in "Rix Road" are really playing on set-- they did ADR over top for sound quality but in order to give the actors the right feel, the musicians are really playing and the instruments all are fully functional. The musicians are a mix of studio musicians who are on the final recording and some talented amateurs who also work as background actors, so you get the imperfect, community-band style tuning, which is what they wanted.

And there's a bunch of other cool stuff, but my ankle is throbbing, so I'm going to go take a painkiller and go to bed I think.

[howwynnderful]

tattoo artist clint x actor reader hc's

a/n: i BEEN wanting to write this one so bad it's like the most perfect fitting job for clint imo. decided to keep this one sfw for all the minors on here. yw ehehe

tattoo artist!clint who has a bunch of his own tattoos, most of which are hidden under his clothes. he only trusts yelena (who is also the only other person who works in his parlor) to do them for him.

tattoo artist!clint who once almost convinced Steve to get a tiny Brooklyn Bridge tattooed on his ankle but then Steve chickened out.

tattoo artist!clint who owns a tattoo parlor on a hidden away street in New York. his store is between a dive bar and a vintage record shop. he most definitely doesn't tattoo the drunk people who come in, but sometimes if they say something exceptionally stupid he can't help himself and tattoos it on them (in temporary ink).

tattoo artist!clint who makes a lot of money off of the people who stop by his tattoo parlor on their way to the bar. but he also gives so many free tattoos to people who get them for special meanings. cancer survivors, abuse survivors, etc, he won't say a thing until the tattoos done and then won't let them pay him no matter how big or small the tattoo was.

tattoo artist!clint who's best at geo-realism. all his years of having to be precise with shooting an arrow gave him steady hands that are perfect for tattooing people. he's done so many intricate tattoos and loves when they incorporate animals. his favorite was when a client had a hawk a part of their tattoo.

tattoo artist!clint who ends up falling for someone who's almost the complete opposite of him. a very extroverted actor who came in with a few friends on impulse because they just celebrated a big show wanted a tattoo to commemorate the moment.

tattoo artist!clint who opens up his drawer of fidgets and candy and hands whatever the nervous actor in the chair in front of him wants. clint didn't usually talk much with clients but you were so talkative he just felt bad letting you go on without response.

tattoo artist!clint who accidentally agreed to go on a date with you to a diner down the street once he closed up and didn't realize it was a date until you kissed him at the end. he didn't mind at all though, he talked to you through the night and realized you weren't all that flashy and were actually someone who enjoyed smaller things.

tattoo artist!clint who loves fixing things for you. when you brought him to your apartment for the first, before he left, he fixed your lamp and your flickering ceiling light. it was practically a love language for him, you wouldn't even have to say anything, if he noticed it, he'd fix it.

tattoo artist!clint who once the both of you got closer and dated for a bit longer thrived on small touches. he loved when you'd just hold his hand or when you didn't mind him laying his head on your lap when he was tired.

tattoo artist!clint who always makes eyecontact with you when you're speaking, and it is deep eye contact. one time when you brought it up with him, he seemed to not realize he actually did that. but you love whenever he does it, it makes you feel so heard. (plus it was kinda hot).

tattoo artist!clint who'll give you all the free tattoos you want, but you don't want many. you let him choose whatever he wants to tattoo on you once for fun and you ended up leaving the studio with a geo-realism tattoo that incorporated your favorite animal and love for astrology.

tattoo artist!clint who let you try to tattoo him after practicing a few times on fake skin. it might not have been the most perfect tattoo, but in clints eyes it was the most beautiful and he'd trace over the little, kinda curvy, arrow that they tattooed. (bonus points if it's a gay couple and clint's partner makes jokes about neither the arrow or clint being straight).

tattoo artist!clint who loves to kiss over the tattoo he did for you. it makes him smile every time you wear something that shows it off.

tattoo artist!clint who sleeps like he's dead but will wake up the minute you try to get out of bed and will pull you back in without saying a thing. the man will not let you move and stays holding you until he decides to get up himself.

[lovetaroandtaemin]

Kinktober 2024

Day 23: Breeding Kink

Goo Gunil x Reader

Word Count: 1,595

THIS FIC IS NSFW, MINORS DNI!!!

Warnings: Mean dom!Gunil x sub!Reader, breeding kink, reader is a MASSIVE brat, reader records herself masturbating, safewords are mentioned but not used, unprotected sex, rough sex, creampie, daddy kink, a little bit of crying, degradation, dumbification, overstimulation. If you think I missed a warning, let me know!

A/N: If you would like to be added to my Kinktober taglist, you can send an ask, send a dm, or comment on any of my Kinktober-related posts with the username that you'd like tagged. Happy reading!

Taglist: @unlikelysublimekryptonite

Fic is under the cut.

Gunil knew from the moment he left your apartment to go to the studio that you were going to act like a brat. Why did you find so much enjoyment in teasing him at work specifically? He had no idea, but usually he didn’t care. For the most part, your brattiness while he was at work was manageable. You would flirt with him a bit over text, but you always stopped as soon as you were reprimanded. This time, however, you decided to go significantly beyond your typical antics. You’d hardly seen him for weeks, and now that you both had a day off from work, he had promised you that you’d spend the day together. Then he got a call from Jungsu, and he rushed off to the studio. Sure, he told you that he would make it up to you, but you still wanted his attention right then and there. So, you felt you were well within your rights to act like a brat.

You decided to begin your antics by sending Gunil a bunch of texts about how badly you wanted him to come home and fuck you. That didn’t really bother him in all honesty. What really started to get to him was when you started sending him texts about how badly you specifically wanted him to pump you full of his cum and get you pregnant. That was strike one. Since you’d found out that he had a breeding kink, you’d used it to your advantage. He knew that was what you were doing, so he reminded you that he really had to work.

Strike two was when you sent Gunil a picture of you wearing his favorite set of lingerie that you owned. It was baby pink, with an adorable floral pattern. He loved how sweet you looked when you wore it, and seeing the picture only made him more desperate to get done what he needed to do so he could come home and rail you. He still had work to do, however, so he told you again how important it was for you to behave because he had to work. You originally decided to behave, but once you had an idea, your decision changed.

You slowly removed the lingerie that you were wearing and started to rub your clit. You knew that you’d get in trouble for touching yourself, but that was kind of the point. You loved it when Gunil was rough with you, and you knew that was exactly what would happen if you pushed his buttons. Sure, you knew that his work was important, but you also knew that he would never actually let you get in the way of his work. Besides, if he actually had a problem with how you were acting, he would use your safeword. Instead, he had only teased you back, so you figured that it wouldn’t be a big deal.

While you continued teasing your clit with one hand, you started an audio recording with the other. When you were certain your phone was recording, you moved your hand faster and made a point to moan louder than you typically would. It was against most of Gunil’s rules for you, but that was why you were doing it. Once you were satisfied with the length of the recording, you sent it.

Once you sent the recording, you watched your phone diligently for a response from Gunil. It took a few minutes for him to see your message, but when he did, his reaction was exactly what you were looking for. At first, the typing bubble popped up and disappeared again over and over as he struggled to figure out what to say in response to your stunt. Then, the indication that he was typing went away for what felt like an eternity. When it popped back up, you waited. Then, he finally responded with a message that said, “I’ll be home in 10 minutes. When I get there, you’d better be naked and bent over on the bed.”

And that was strike three.

For a brief moment, you considered not following instructions, either by getting yourself fully dressed or by waiting in a different position. In the end, though, you decided against it. You had already gotten yourself into quite a bit of trouble, and you didn’t know if you wanted it to be worse than it was going to be. So, you bent over on your bed, already naked from your earlier stunt.

You waited for what felt like ages for Gunil to get home, but realistically it was probably only a few minutes. You knew that he was home because you heard him clear his throat behind you and say, “What the fuck was that?”

“What do you mean, daddy?”

“You know exactly what I mean, sweetheart. Why did you send me a recording of you touching yourself while you knew I was working?”

“I missed you and wanted your attention.”

“You are aware that you don’t have to act like a brat to get my attention, right?”

“I know, but it’s so much more fun this way.”

“If you’re gonna be this fucking mouthy, maybe I should just make you watch me get off instead of fucking you like I originally planned.”

“Please fuck me, daddy. I promise I’ll be a good girl.”

“That’s what I thought.” Gunil paused for a moment before he added, “What’s your color, baby?”

“Green.”

“Good girl.”

Gunil inserted his cock into you with no warning. You winced at the sudden intrusion, but it didn’t take long for the pain you were feeling to turn to pure pleasure. While he fucked you, he said things like “You’re such a slut,” and “You’re lucky I wasn’t busy with anything important.” You wanted to be embarrassed by the way that he degraded you, but it only added to the pleasure.

The moans that fell from your lips were like music to Gunil’s ears. Sure, he had left a lot of work to be done at the studio, but coming home to fuck you was a welcome break from it all. When he felt you around him, it was like all of the stress he was feeling around his job went away, and all he needed to worry about was making you feel good.

“Fuck, princess. Feels so good,” Gunil said with a groan, “Can’t wait to fill you up with my cum.”

“Please, please, please,” you chanted, too out of it to really tell what you were begging for. You knew that Gunil was talking to you, but you were so fucked out you only caught every other word. You heard the words “fill” and “cum,” though, and that was all you needed to understand. As he continued fucking you, it was like your brain shut off. How he was that good at fucking you, you’d never know. You would never complain, though.

“You’re taking it so well, baby,” he said, “It’s like you were made for me.”

When Gunil heard you mumble, “Harder, daddy,” it took every ounce of self-control that he had in order to not cum right then and there. He wanted to make this last as long as possible, though, so he held out as long as he could. The way your pussy seemed to suck him in while you begged him for more made it infinitely more difficult, however.

When you felt a familiar heat in the pit of your stomach, you pleaded with Gunil to let you cum. For a moment, he considered toying with you by telling you that you wouldn’t be allowed to cum at all after the stunt you pulled to get him home. Watching you babble and sob as he fucked you made him go soft, though. So, he said, “Go ahead, baby. Cum for daddy.”

As soon as you had permission, you came with a scream. Gunil continued fucking you through your release, desperate to reach his own. When he felt his orgasm approaching, he asked, “I’m close, baby. Are you ready?”

You nodded and said, “Please fill me up, daddy. Want you to give me a baby.” With one more loud groan, Gunil stilled inside of you, filling you with his cum. He continued to fuck you through the aftershocks of his release until you said, “’s too much, daddy.”

Gunil quickly pulled out, helping you to stand. You held onto him for dear life as you found your footing. Once he was certain you were stable, he helped you to the bathroom and into the shower. You whined when he had to let go of you, but you quickly calmed down when he got into the shower with you. As he helped you wash up, you felt nothing but love for him. Sure, you’d primarily said that you wanted Gunil to give you a baby in the heat of the moment, but the more you thought about it, the more you realized you did actually want to have kids with him one day.

When you were both done in the shower, you practically dragged Gunil back to your bed to cuddle. He wanted to protest, citing the work that he had left unfinished to come home, but he didn’t have the heart to tell you no when you still seemed to be in such a vulnerable headspace. So, he happily got into bed with you, holding you close while he told you over and over how much he loved you and how badly he wanted a family with you.

Thank you for reading! If you'd like to see what else I've written so far and the rest of what's planned, you can find my Kinktober masterlist here. If you'd like to read one of my non-Kinktober works, you can find my general masterlist here. If you'd like to see what I'm going to be working on once Kinktober is over, you can find my upcoming works here. If none of that interests you, or there's something specific you'd like to see, send a request via asks or dms!

Thank you again for reading, happy spooky season!